Haworth Tompkins - Performing Arts

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Performing Arts

HaworthTompkins
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“Hurrah for Haworth Tompkins. There is now a generation of audiences who won’t remember what theatres were like before this inspiring firm of architects shook them up and opened them out. Before 2000 the Royal Court did not have its big red drum, the Egg in Bath had not been hatched, the Young Vic was all bunched up, Battersea Arts Centre’s different rooms were closed in on themselves. Haworth Tompkins have made theatres more welcoming, more continuous with life outside. They started reshaping the stage when site-specific work was beginning to boom, reminding audiences of the importance of the places in which we see plays. Their impact has been as great as that of an artistic director.”

“Haworth Tompkins are London’s default theatre architects, whose works span the magically ad hoc to the unutterably grand.”

“The Shakespeare of modern-day theatre architects.”

“Above all, the brilliant thing about working with Haworth Tompkins is their camaraderie, teamwork, sense of humour and ability to tolerate high levels of stress whilst remaining true to the vision of the project.”

“A body of work as rich in character as that of any practice working in Britain today...these buildings feel like eternal works in progress, open to reinvention from production to production, even from night to night.”

“We owe a debt of gratitude to an architectural practice who don’t just do design, they also do cultural change.”

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Edwin Dame Vikki Heywood The Telegraph David Jubb, Artistic Director
HaworthTompkins

We have been immersed in thinking about, talking about, designing and experiencing performing arts buildings for three decades now, working with many of the world’s most influential show makers. We are regularly named amongst the most experienced and influential theatre architects currently practicing. Our explorations have ranged from developing ideas of increased porosity, accessibility and welcome of front of house, to the potency of provisional or temporary performance space, to high density adaptive auditoria, through to civilised dressing rooms and publicly engaging production workshops. All are driven by an overarching mission to rewire our thinking around sustainability, well-being and regenerative design. We work best in collaborative relationships: with clients, with artists; and with innovative suppliers. Our experience has helped us to understand that designing a performance space, whether large or small, retrofitting or building new, is a creative relationship that can be transformative for us all.

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Young Vic
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Bristol Old Vic

We have developed a deep sensitivity to how a performance room ‘works’, honing the intensity of relationship between actor and audience - and between every member of the audience to each other - that is essential in generating a shared, theatrically electrified experience. We see the auditorium design not so much as crafting a finished object, but rather as forming a permissive framework to host generations of incoming show makers. We strive for rooms with malleability and adaptability to give directors and designers a welcoming and potent room to empower their work - both emotionally and technically - and to fully embrace the audience.

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Young Vic
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Bridge Theatre Bush Theatre

Theatres are an increasingly rare bastion of public gathering space, places for people of all backgrounds to meet in a welcoming, inclusive environment. Foyers are important public rooms in their own right, an extension of the public realm, a gathering space for a diverse audience to meet, relax, prepare for and reflect upon a shared experience. Foyers need to have an intuitive clarity of welcome, orientation and circulation and be capable of working throughout the rhythms of the day, absorbing swings of low and high occupancies, feeling charged and activated whatever the density. We pay particularly attention to ensure the foyer has a robust materiality that ages gracefully, has good acoustics tuned to ensure pleasant noise levels and intelligibility, and that, crucially, the lighting has a range of atmospheres from relaxed informal café to theatrically intensified pre show. We love spaces that can drop down to almost candlelit levels when the mood requires.

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Bristol Old Vic
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Bush Theatre Everyman Theatre Young Vic

We work collaboratively with the theatre artistic and technical teams, specialist theatre consultants and suppliers to find the right balance of technical infrastructure with an eye on cost effectiveness and low energy solutions. For adaptive spaces, we love to explore an ‘intelligent manual’ approach to stage engineering: robust, intuitive, low tech, cost effective and artistically permissive rather than complex, over-automated, expensive and quickly obsolete.

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Battersea Arts Centre
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Theatre Royal Drury Lane Bristol Old Vic

Designing efficient, effective production spaces requires a deep understanding of theatrical making processes and sequences, and of the connections to performance and rehearsal stages. Production workshops are rare inner city creative ‘factories’ oozing magic and intrigue. Our experience has shown there is a huge public interest in connecting with these making processes, both from safe internal viewpoints and from views in from the street. Dressing rooms, rehearsal rooms, workspace have traditionally been rather neglected, utilitarian spaces. Because we have learned that a happy cast and a happy crew is a happy theatre, we give equal concentration to back of house space and take great pleasure in getting to know and engage with the full technical, costume, production, front of house and administration teams to tune the spaces to their working methods and to impart shared knowledge of new methods.

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Everyman Theatre National Theatre
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Young Vic Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre Donmar Dryden Street Royal Court Theatre Everyman Theatre

In addition to public facing auditoria and foyers many of our theatres include dedicated education, community and emerging talent spaces, enabling the organisations we work with to substantially expand their outreach programmes to the widest and most diverse audience. Spaces we have designed have included: writers hubs for new and emerging theatre makers, Clore learning spaces engaging all ages of the local community and shared workspaces to share skills, grow businesses and enable new connections. As conglomerate civic spaces we aim for our theatres to be available - and meaningful - to the whole community.

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The Egg
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National Theatre The Den Everyman Theatre

We are facing a planetary emergency which demands urgent and wide-ranging changes in all of our activities. Theatres will continue to be a crucial part of our collective public culturethe spaces where we can share stories of our common humanity in real time - but those spaces need to change, alongside the organisations and productions they support. We have world-leading knowledge and experience both of retrofitting old buildings to sustainable, contemporary performance use and of designing new theatre spaces that aspire to be a positive contributor to the living world. We champion the principles of regenerative design through advocacy, research and live projects and we are on track to design only zero whole life carbon buildings by 2030 in accordance with our public commitments. Beyond building design, we are embarking on transformative relationships with client organisations to embed regenerative practices throughout the performing arts.

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Young Vic

Haworth Tompkins is one of the world’s leading theatre architects, with twenty-five years’ experience of theatre design and over 180 major awards including the RIBA Stirling Prize for the Liverpool Everyman. We are also one of the leading proponents of regenerative design, whereby architecture is considered as an indivisible component of self-sustaining and constantly evolving planetary life support systems. We are a founder and key driver of Architects Declare, now a 7500 strong multi-disciplinary network of built environment organisations in 28 countries advocating to build a safe and just space for humanity to thrive within ecological boundaries. We have re-engineered our business model and our ownership structure to those ends; we are an Employee Owned Trust and a Certified B Corporation. Our combined architectural, social and environmental ethos earned us the AJ100 Practice of the Year award in both 2020 and 2022.

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Bristol Old Vic

Our Projects

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24 HaworthTompkins HT PERFORMING ARTS PROJECTS - LONDON 1. Almeida Gainsborough 2. Almeida King’s Cross 3. Battersea Arts Centre 4. Bridge Theatre 5. Bush Theatre 6. Donmar Dryden Street 7. Lightroom 8. National Theatre 9. National Theatre Studio 10. Punchdrunk Woolwich 11. Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre 12. Royal Court Theatre 13. @sohoplace 14. Olympia Theatre 15. Theatre Royal Drury Lane 16. The Old Vic 17. The Shed 18. Young Vic HT PERFORMING ARTS PROJECTS - UK 19. Bristol Old Vic 20. Chichester Festival Theatre 21. Everyman Theatre, Liverpool 22. Liverpool Playhouse 23. Theatr Clwyd, Mold 24. The Den, Manchester 25. The Egg and Ustinov Theatre, Bath 26. The North Wall Arts Centre, Oxford 27. Peter Hall Performing Arts Centre, Cambridge 28. Snape Maltings, Suffolk HT PERFORMING ARTS PROJECTS - WORLDWIDE 29. American Repertory Theater, Boston (USA) 30. ECU City Campus, Perth (Australia) 31. Malmo Stadsteater, Malmo (Sweden) 32. Sentralbadet, Bergen (Norway) 33. The Court Theatre, Christchurch (New Zealand) 29 30 31 32 Hammersmith Fulham Merton Wandsworth Kensington & Chelsea 5 14 Hammersmith & Fulham
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City
Enfield Waltham
Newham
Hackney
4 3 8&17 9&16 11 12 18 13 6&15 28 26 25 24 21&22 23 20 19 27 1 2&7 10
Hammersmith & Fulham
Lambeth Bexley Greenwich Lewisham Bromley Croydon Sutton Merton Wandsworth Southwark Kensington Chelsea
of Westminster City of London Camden Islington Haringey
Forest Redbridge
Tower Hamlets
Barking & Dagenham

Almeida Theatre, Gainsborough Studios, 2000 & King’s Cross, 2001

The Almeida Theatre, searching for a temporary venue in which to stage large scale productions

negotiated a one-year lease on a former power station from the developer and

the building for the lowest possible cost. The great turbine hall was returned to its original

intermediate floor, creating a single space over 25m high. Basic soundproofing was installed and a simple scaffold seating system developed to create a large courtyard auditorium on three levels. The remainder of the building was treated almost entirely as ‘found’ and formed the various bars and foyers. Scaffold staircases, ramps and simple cut openings were inserted to deal with the complex fire escape and circulation requirements for an audience of 900. Maintaining the sense of discovery and risk one feels on first entering a derelict building was an important part of the experience. The result was a spectacular but surprisingly intimate auditorium, in which the old building was allowed to become an integral and essential part of the performances. Having played to full houses for every performance throughout the summer of 2000, the venue closed at the end of the season and has now been demolished as planned.

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of Richard II and Coriolanus, commissioned Haworth Tompkins to convert volume by the demolition of an
ADDRESS HOXTON, LONDON CLIENT THE ALMEIDA THEATRE AUDITORIUM CAPACITY 900

“Haworth Tompkins intelligence and insight were very evident. They worked excellently and sensitively with everyone to create two performing spaces and a wonderful foyer. The few architectural ‘moves’ that were made were bold, low-cost and highly expressive: amongst them, a glowing polycarbonate entrance; roof and walls clad with grass as the solution to sound and heat insulation.” Nick Starr

This second temporary theatre for the Almeida was made in a derelict bus depot in Kings Cross, scheduled for demolition, converted to provide two auditoria of 550 and 300 seats respectively along with full front and back of house facilities. Inside the theatre, the industrial interiors were left raw, with stairs, bar and WC facilities dropped into the space to modify their proportions and establish a sense of arrival, reinforced by a long panel of back-lit yellow plastic sheet to mark the theatre entrance down a narrow alleyway. The main auditorium exploited a wide, low space to create an unusual proscenium stage, used to great effect by stage designers and directors. The other space was more classically proportioned, allowing easy re-configuration for each show. To achieve the necessary sound insulation, the roof and gables of the building were turfed in sedum, loaned by a landscape contractor. The resulting pitched roof garden, full of wildflowers in the centre of a busy urban block, became a local landmark for the year in which the theatre operated. From discovering the building to opening night, the entire project was completed in 17 weeks. Both projects, now long demolished, nevertheless changed perceptions of the neighbourhoods in which they were built, and established themselves in the collective memory as large scale, site-specific performances.

ADDRESS KING’S CROSS, LONDON CLIENT THE ALMEIDA THEATRE AUDITORIUM CAPACITY 550 & 330

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Battersea Arts Centre, 2018

Since 1974, Battersea Town Hall has been home to one of the most important incubators of new performance work in the UK. Haworth Tompkins worked here intensively alongside the Battersea Arts Centre team, the local community and theatre artists for over a decade. Seeking to reinvent the conventional supplier/consumer model of architectural practice, a number of jointly-improvised, non-invasive alterations were originally made alongside specific productions - such as Punchdrunk’s Masque of the Red Death - to test strategies for change and to evolve a playful but rigorous architectural language. A brief for more permanent work was then developed, including the creation of a new courtyard performance space in a disused light well and the conversion of unused attics and rooftops for offices and a garden. Cumulatively the entire interior has been rennovated to allow multiple, interconnected performances, heritage spaces and community uses. In 2015 we were commissioned to rebuild the building’s Grand Hall after a shocking fire that partially destroyed it. The former decorative plaster vault was the starting point for a new timber grid ceiling, allowing far greater theatrical possibilities. The surfaces of the walls of the hall and its surrounding corridors have been preserved in their extraordinary, almost Pompeiian post-fire state.

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ADDRESS
LAVENDER HILL, BATTERSEA CLIENT BATTERSEA ARTS CENTRE LONDON

“Haworth Tompkins have been superb partners through the process. Steve’s design work integrates the vision of the client and his own passion for space, not as an abstract artistic object but as a living, breathing, functioning body that seeks to connect with its inhabitants. Steve’s whole team have brilliantly delivered, always going the extra mile to realise a project as imagined.”

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Theatre,

The Bridge Theatre, the first venue of the London Theatre Company, occupies a found space on an extraordinary riverside site overlooking Tower Bridge and the Tower of London. The brief called for an urbane, welcoming venue with leading edge flexibility of staging formats. A high, brightly daylit timber-lined foyer functions as a friendly public congregation space throughout the day and evening. Acoustics are controlled by the use of canvas and felt ceiling banners, with lighting supplied by 500 bespoke copper fittings. The auditorium itself is a completely new design approach, designed in collaboration with the London Theatre Company team and stage engineering manufacturers Tait. The room was made and tested offsite in modular form before being erected as fully coordinated, finished components in the existing building shell. Sightlines and natural acoustics were tested and tuned in the digital design model and using full scale mock ups. A highly flexible, modular stalls and stage zone allow multiple formats to be easily and efficiently achieved in a very short turnaround time between productions. Using these revolutionary techniques, the theatre opened just two years after the site was acquired. Other versions of this system are being developed for different capacities.

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CLIENT
AUDITORIUM CAPACITY
Bridge
2017 ADDRESS POTTERS FIELDS PARK,
LONDON THEATRE COMPANY
LONDON 950
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“This project, my eighth with HT, has been a joy from start to finish. The keynotes of the process have been collaboration and trust, infused with their characteristic intelligence and tenacity. Their design of a new form of auditorium will, I hope, be adopted far and wide.”
Nick Starr
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Bristol Old Vic, 2018

Bristol Old Vic is the oldest continuously working theatre in Europe, completed in 1766. Successive alterations over the years culminated in 1972 with a new foyer and street frontage by the respected British architect Peter Moro, whose scheme incorporated the neighbouring historic Coopers’ Hall as the main entrance and circulation space. The auditorium and back of house spaces were skilfully renovated by architect Andrzej Blonski in 2012, after which Haworth Tompkins worked to open up the Grade I listed theatre’s front of house to a wider, more diverse audience and to place the theatre more visibly at the heart of Bristol’s public life and public space. Radical change was required to address these aims, and so the decision was taken to remove and rebuild entirely the 1970s additions, replacing them with a more transparent and legible foyer space, a new studio theatre in the lower half of the Coopers’ Hall and a reinstated grand public room as originally located in its upper half. The new foyer is conceived as an extension of the street, a covered public square enclosed by a framework of timber and glass to bring day light deep into the space and reveal the much-altered façade of the auditorium for the first time.

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ADDRESS
STUDIO
CAPACITY 148
KING STREET, BRISTOL CLIENT BRISTOL OLD VIC
AUDITORIUM
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“these atmospheric and characterful plans have brilliantly unlocked Bristol Old Vic’s historical riches and allowed us to reveal Bristol’s architectural gem of a theatre after nearly 250 years.” Tom Morris

Bush Theatre, 2017

Formerly housed in a room above a pub in London’s Shepherd’s Bush, the Bush theatre is deeply embedded in its diverse west London community, presenting cutting edge new work for a new generation. Haworth Tompkins helped the theatre to find a new home in a former public library (already relocated elsewhere) and to organise a series of public consultation and participation events to develop the brief and establish the feel of the new space. These processes resulted in a temporary, experimental use of the building for the first year of occupation, providing an auditorium, a foyer and rudimentary back of house spaces on a very tight budget. The second, more permanent phase of work has provided better facilities for staff and performers, enabled barrier-free access to the whole building for the first time, added a new performance and community events studio and meeting space, extended the public foyer and connected it to a new, fully accessible entrance courtyard which connects directly with the public street. Throughout the project, both architect and client have made maximum use of modest resources to expand the Bush’s mission for a far wider community of theatre makers and audiences.

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ADDRESS UXBRIDGE ROAD, LONDON CLIENT BUSH THEATRE AUDITORIUM CAPACITY 144
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“We are proud of the landmark redevelopment of the Bush Theatre, wonderfully re-imagined by Haworth Tompkins. While our transformation has had an immediate impact, our project provides us with a sustainable platform for years to come. It enables us to work with more artists, welcome more audiences and to have a fundamental impact on the community in Shepherd’s Bush.”
Lauren Clancy and Madani Younis

Chichester Festival Theatre, 2014

This project is a major restoration and renewal of the Grade II* listed Chichester Festival Theatre, incorporating a carefully remodelled auditorium, bigger foyer spaces, an improved parkland setting and a new back of house extension. Originally designed as a ‘pavilion in the park’ summer festival venue by the distinguished architects Powell and Moya, the innovative open stage auditorium was inspired by Tyrone Guthrie’s Festival Theatre in Stratford Ontario and was the UK’s first thrust stage performance space, seating over 1300 people. The theatre’s dramatic, cantilevering concrete structure and lightweight cable-tied roof remain bold architectural statements, but piecemeal alterations since the 1970s had gradually reduced the clarity of the original architecture. Haworth Tompkins’ approach has been to clear away all the non-original structures, enlarge the foyer with two new extensions and re-house the back of house facilities within a new structure, complementing Powell and Moya’s rough concrete with an equally dramatic facade of Cor-Ten weathering steel. Regular collaborating artist Antoni Malinowski hand-painted the café ceilings and various walls within the foyer to complement the geometries of the existing structure and amplify the presence of the surrounding landscape. The auditorium has been significantly remodelled to improve sightlines, increase theatrical intensity and provide a far more technically sophisticated and adaptable environment for theatre makers.

AUDITORIUM CAPACITY

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ADDRESS OAKLANDS
PARK, CHICHESTER CLIENT CHICHESTER FESTIVAL THEATRE
1300
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“The great thing about the superbly renovated Chichester Festival Theatre is that it simply seems like a better version of its former self.” The Telegraph

Donmar Dryden Street, 2013

Having acquired a small 19th Century warehouse building in London’s Covent Garden, the Donmar Warehouse theatre asked Haworth Tompkins to convert it for rehearsal, education and support facilities. The challenge was to design a convivial working environment within the constraints of a limited budget and a tightly enclosed site. By removing existing floors, extending the roof space and replanning the circulation routes, the new project yields a double height rehearsal room of a similar size to the main Donmar stage, a street fronting green room, administration offices, a large education studio in the roof rafters and a new attic apartment for visiting artists. Stripped back and partially demolished walls and ceilings have been left raw as a suitably theatrical backdrop to the Donmar’s working life, with a new polychromatic staircase, hand painted by regular collaborating artist Antoni Malinowski, as the warm heart of the building. The personality of the historic architecture has been allowed to set the tone, with a provisional, loose-fit language of new additions setting up a fluid, adaptable relationship of new and old. Materials added have been simple and straightforward complement the richly patinated texture of the found surfaces. The aim is very much for a benign occupation rather than an obliteration of the original fabric.

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ADDRESS
DRYDEN STREET, LONDON CLIENT

“Dryden Street has had an immediate, transformative effect on the life of the Donmar. The warm, adventurous and pragmatic spirit of the building has changed our working lives. There is a generous and familial spirit to the rooms, and the building is a great invitation to creativity and communication. Everyone goes into work that bit happier, and artists working in the building have - in our first month - been overjoyed with the atmosphere.”

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The Den is a nomadic, lightweight auditorium, commissioned by the Manchester Royal

Designed to be portable, it is capable of being built and dismantled by the audiences it serves and will host performances, debates and community events on a regular cycle of temporary residencies within communities in and around Manchester. Working alongside the theatre production team, structural engineers Expedition and specialist timber designers and fabricators Xylotec, a sketch design quickly emerged for a circular theatre with a series of 15 ‘cranes’ around the perimeter, which raise the roof through the use of pulleys and ropes. Materials are recyclable or compostable, designed for minimal environmental impact. The structure is a slender larch and hemp rope frame, so light that it requires no foundations. The frame and covering are designed to be easily adjustable to achieve different diameters and seating capacities to suit different ‘host’ buildings. The enclosure is made of canvas and concertina cardboard seats are folded out in rings to create the in-the-round space. Felt cushions are secured by clothes pegs. The Den is intended to embed itself in the lives of local communities in and around Manchester through successive visits.

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The
ADDRESS MANCHESTER CLIENT ROYAL EXCHANGE THEATRE AUDITORIUM CAPACITY 186
Exchange theatre.
Den, 2019
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“The Den has been a brilliant collaboration with the team at Haworth Tompkins resulting in a new and unique low carbon travelling theatre that will help us inspire and engage the communities of Greater Manchester.”
Simon Curtis

The Egg is a 120-seat children’s theatre in Bath, built within the shell of a listed Victorian church hall. Lacking any remaining interior fabric of value, we retained the façade and inserted an egg-shaped auditorium structure into the centre of the building, supported by a street level café, a basement workshop and a rooftop rehearsal space. The auditorium, which can be daylit from the existing windows, is highly adaptable and playfully detailed, but is nevertheless designed to evoke the glamour of the beautiful Georgian theatre next door. The café is a robust, friendly and accessible meeting place used throughout the day and evening by audiences, families with young children and the general public alike. A new circulation stair winds in and out of an enclosed former light well and incorporates lookout points, balconies and seats, inviting exploration and play. Materials are designed to complement the shell of the original building, while a mirrored café ceiling sets up games of inversion and distortion. We tried to adapt the scale and personality of the spaces throughout with young people in mind, helped by a group of children and young people who were involved in the briefing and development of the design from the outset. Adults are welcome of course, but the building belongs to the children.

52 The Egg, 2005 ADDRESS SAWCLOSE, BATH CLIENT THEATRE ROYAL BATH AUDITORIUM CAPACITY 120

“When it is full of children, the atmosphere is beyong electric, and prepared adults should enter at their own risk. There are no stifling facilities-management regimes. Nothing here is precious. This is very much a building for children and this has everything to do with the building’s design.”

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Theatre,

The Everyman is a new building to re-house an iconic Liverpool theatre. Like its predecessor, the auditorium is an adaptable thrust stage space of 406 seats, now constructed from the reclaimed bricks of Hope Hall; the former building. The bricks have created the internal walls of the foyers. Foyers and catering spaces are arranged on three levels including a new bistro, culminating in a long first floor foyer overlooking the street. The building incorporates numerous creative workspaces, with a rehearsal room, workshops, a sound studio, a writers’ room overlooking the foyer, and a community studio space. Our design combines thermally massive construction with a series of natural ventilation systems and low energy technical infrastructures to achieve a BREEAM Excellent rating for this complex and densely inhabited urban building. The main façade of the building is as a large-scale public work of art consisting of 105 moveable metal sunshades, each one carrying a life-sized portrait of a contemporary Liverpool resident. Typographer and artist Jake Tilson created a special font for a new version of the iconic red ‘Everyman’ sign, whilst regular collaborating visual artist Antoni Malinowski made a large painted ceiling piece for the foyer, to complement an internal palette of brickwork, black steel, oak, reclaimed Iroko, deeply coloured plywood and pale in situ concrete.

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Everyman
2013 ADDRESS HOPE STREET, LIVERPOOL CLIENT EVERYMAN AND PLAYHOUSE THEATRES AUDITORIUM CAPACITY 406
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“It’s a beautiful space inside and out. From the moment you approach it, it feels welcoming and inclusive…but it is also deeply symbolic: this is a theatre of and for its people….a masterpiece.”
The Stage

National Theatre, 2013

The NT Future project has transformed the UK’s biggest theatre into a more contemporary, welcoming and popular building for the public, significantly improved the production capacity and working conditions of the organisation, and dramatically improved the creative potential of the theatre for artists. The entire public and working realm has been reimagined, and the external spaces around the building redesigned to provide a new riverside destination for theatregoers and the general public. A new build extension houses a 15m high scenic workshop and design studios along with all the servicing requirements of the theatre, freeing up the valuable riverside elevation for public use and crucial revenue generation. The making workshops have been refitted and streamlined to improve the productivity and technical capacity of the organisation. A public walkway allows the workshops to be viewed, unaccompanied, directly from the theatre foyer. The former Cottesloe, now Dorfman theatre, has been completely refitted to accommodate a state of the art adaptable seating system that can transform from a conventional 350-seat rake to a seat-free flat floor in a matter of minutes. Elsewhere, new bars, restaurants and cafés have hugely improved the energy and commercial potential of the foyers and external spaces around the theatre.

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ADDRESS
CLIENT NATIONAL THEATRE DORFMAN AUDITORIUM CAPACITY 464
SOUTH BANK, LONDON
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“...this venerable modern monument is looking better than it has done for a long time, and in some ways ever.” The Observer
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National Theatre Studio, 2008

This project involved the conversion and conservation of the listed former production building of the next door Old Vic theatre into rehearsal and development spaces. The renowned Brutalist building had been used on a provisional basis as the National’s creative laboratory for many years previously, so our task was to upgrade and extend the technical and theatrical capability of the spaces without losing the acquired patina of use and the sense of an ad hoc environment for creative experimentation. This required an acute sensitivity to materials, surface and light in order to reinforce the fundamental qualities of the space whilst upgrading technical capacity, expanding available workspaces and improving the artistic capabilities of the building. The new facilities include two large studios, a third education studio converted from a redundant service yard and a public archive with reading room and seminar room, along with smaller work spaces, offices, dressing rooms and a green room. Douglas Fir plywood, painted brick and concrete, ceramic floor tiles and woodwool ceilings remain the reduced palate of internal materials. The day-to-day life of the building now centres around a double height circulation spine, converted from the former paint frame pit and still encrusted with decades of scenic paint.

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ADDRESS THE CUT, LONDON CLIENT NATIONAL THEATRE
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“...this exemplary project by Haworth Tompkins of a 1950s brutalist masterpiece ensures its future as the National Theatre’s secret ideas laboratory.” Ellis Woodman

The North Wall arts centre at St Edward’s School, Oxford, incorporates the conversion of a listed but disused Victorian swimming pool and a new studio and foyer building. The swimming pool and outbuildings provided the enclosure for a new timber-framed 250 seat flexible auditorium and support spaces, while the remaining accommodation is housed in a series of contemporary ‘barns’ arranged along the existing wall. A foyer and gallery space in the centre of the linear building allows direct access both from the town and school sides, reflecting the art centre’s dual role as a school facility and public building. The interior is made of simple, hard-wearing materials: polished concrete, stained plywood panels and natural plywood slats. High levels of insulation, combined with carefully sized windows, help to minimise the energy use in heating and ventilating the spaces. Externally, the walls and roof of the building are clad in unseasoned English oak shakes (hand-split tiles) and slender green oak slats (both carbon neutral materials), designed to bend and twist into organic, patinated surfaces that will vary in colour and texture according to orientation and exposure. The combination of vernacular forms, large frameless windows and a traditional cladding material give the building a rich, abstract quality, appearing both familiar and strange in the sensitive historic setting of the school and its immediate surroundings.

66 The North Wall, 2006 ADDRESS WOODSTOCK ROAD,
CLIENT ST
AUDITORIUM CAPACITY 300
OXFORD
EDWARD’S SCHOOL
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“What we have now is unanimously recognised as something really beautiful. The School refer to it as the jewel in their crown, and the public reaction has confirmed what a vibrant and intimate space it is.”
George

Peter Hall Performing Arts Centre, 2018

The Perse School in Cambridge is a new building to house the school’s extensive programme of music and drama activities which had outgrown its previous home. The Performing Arts Centre is named after Peter Hall, who was a pupil at the school and went on to be the director of the National Theatre, an institution with which Haworth Tompkins has a long association. The project includes a 400-seat auditorium, an adaptable foyer space that incorporates a large, daylit rehearsal and teaching room, an exhibition space and full back of house dressing rooms, workshop and ancillary spaces, along with a suite of classrooms. The triple-height, galleried foyer with a ‘diagrid’ timber roof structure, is naturally daylit and overlooks a landscaped courtyard which will form the new heart of the school. The space operates as a café for pupils and staff during the school day, and as a foyer for audiences during events in the auditorium. The Performing Arts Centre incorporates full backstage facilities, enabling students to experience all aspects of staging a production and build on the activities of its thriving technical theatre company. The entire building is naturally ventilated via imposing brick roof lanterns which give the building its identity when viewed across a new garden and play space at the heart of the school campus.

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ADDRESS
CAPACITY
HILLS ROAD, CAMBRIDGE CLIENT THE PERSE SCHOOL AUDITORIUM
400
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“Haworth Tompkins’ vast experience in this specialist area of design, and their ability to listen and interpret were invaluable and made for the most productive and enjoyable design process.”

Punchdrunk - One Cartridge Place, 2022

The scheme for Punchdrunk features a temporary entrance pavilion for their new base in south-east London. The pavilion, known as ‘One Cartridge Place’, spans across the carriageway between three listed buildings which house their opening show, and includes an entrance foyer, box office and internal passageways which link the buildings during the performance. Constrained by a temporary lifespan and its connection to listed structures and uneven road surfaces, the lightweight timber framed structure is a complex negotiation of internal floor levels supported by a system of sand-bag foundations. Clad in polycarbonate with a decorative chainmail mesh cladding, the material palette for the link building acknowledges the significance of the adjacent Grade II listed industrial buildings whilst announcing itself as a convivial and welcoming destination. In addition, we designed the cloakroom and toilet areas within the ‘lean-to’ part of the Grade II listed canon manufacturing warehouse, which connect to the temporary pavilion and supported Punchdrunk with their initial office space planning as well as core show infrastructure within the warehouse, creating technical plans for fire compartments, mezzanine, air conditioning and lifts in conjunction with the show’s designer, Livi Vaughan. The internal layouts have been developed to enable the building to become fully accessible for the first time. The interventions are intended to be non-invasive and reversible.

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ADDRESS WOOLWICH WORKS CLIENT PUNCHDRUNK
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“It’s been fantastic working with Haworth Tompkins on realising One Cartridge Place. The practical support and technical expertise they provided has been invaluable, and vital to the success of the project.”
Punchdrunk

Regents Park Open Air Theatre, 2012

The Open Air Theatre, originally designed by the

Howell,

Partridge and Amis, is a successful London producing house as well as a much loved visitor

throughout the summer. Hidden by mature landscape from all sides, the theatrical experience relies on a sense of discovery, of entering a different world within the everyday surroundings of the park. Working with landscape architect Camlin Lonsdale, the first phase of work reconfigured the foyer and front of house areas to create picnic lawns, a new studio for rehearsal, performance, events and catering, sheltered seating areas and a long, covered bar amongst the mature Horse Chestnut trees. A language of planted trellises and woven hazel façades was used to merge architecture and natural landscape into a single, seamless environment. A second phase has added new offices and back of house facilities amongst the trees and a new box office and entrance building, enabling the organisation to remain resident on the site throughout the year for the first time. The new buildings are made of prefabricated timber panels for clean, fast construction and low carbon use. Using a combination of unfinished and dark stained Larch for the external skins, the structures are already growing back into the landscape that envelops them.

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ADDRESS
AUDITORIUM CAPACITY
INNER CIRCLE, LONDON CLIENT REGENT’S PARK THEATRE
1240
respected British architects Killick, attraction
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“Subtly but incisively redesigned by Haworth Tompkins, the building looks sleek and intentional.”
Susanna Clapp

Royal Court Theatre, 2000

The Royal Court represents both risk and continuity in British theatre, a radical tradition of contemporary work performed in a Victorian playhouse. Haworth Tompkins’ equally radical remodelling has transformed the creative and commercial capacity of the organisation by significantly expanding the public areas, renovating and upgrading the main auditorium, rebuilding the studio theatre and replacing the back of house spaces. The conceptual approach was partly archaeological - uncovering hidden layers of the building’s fabric and deciding what should be changed and what left exposed as evidence of a rich past - and partly invasive, demolishing, extending and reconfiguring the space to provide better facilities, improved access and more space. Respect for the past without sentimentality was the guiding principle of the project. The main auditorium was re-seated to achieve much better sightlines, while the previously limited front of house facilities were expanded by constructing a new foyer beneath Sloane Square to accommodate a bar, restaurant and bookshop. The connection between the foyers and the outside world was reinforced by the introduction of more transparent entrances onto the street, a new balcony and a large vermilion mural by Antoni Malinowski on the drum wall of the Auditorium. Materials throughout the project were selected to welcome the passage of time.

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CLIENT
AUDITORIUM CAPACITY 465
ADDRESS SLOANE SQUARE, LONDON
ENGLISH STAGE COMPANY

“The Royal Court’s partnership with architects Haworth Tompkins has been an extraordinary success story for over four years. Their acute awareness of our very particular needs, combined with a deep understanding of the company’s artistic and historical context, has led to a challenging and hugely enjoyable relationship which we believe will result in one of the great playhouses of the modern era.”

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This project is a temporary venue for the National Theatre on London’s South Bank, maintaining a third auditorium while the Cottesloe was closed for a year during the NT Future redevelopment. Designed and built in a year, the Shed is a collaborative process between the building designers, the National Theatre, and theatre-makers who will work in the space, in a way that more closely resembled a theatre show or an art installation than a conventional construction project. Its simple form houses a 225-seat thrust stage auditorium made of raw steel and stained plywood. The rough sawn timber cladding refers to the National Theatre’s iconic board-marked concrete, and the modelling of the auditorium and its corner ventilation towers complement the bold geometries of the National Theatre itself. The brilliant red colour covering the entire mass of a form without doors or windows, announces its arrival boldly against the geometric concrete forms of the NT, giving it a startling and enigmatic presence. Since its opening show in 2013, the Shed attracted a more diverse audience to the NT and helped to re-energise the entire site as the ‘NT Future’ project to regenerate the existing 1976 theatre building unfolds around it.

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The Shed, 2013 ADDRESS SOUTH BANK, LONDON CLIENT NATIONAL THEATRE AUDITORIUM CAPACITY
225
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“This is a building that opens your heart before you get into the auditorium. It’s a building that enables invention.” The Observer

Snape Maltings, 2010

This project is a new addition to Snape Maltings’ internationally important music campus on the marshes of Suffolk’s east coast. The twin aims of the project were to protect the fragile ecology of historic architecture and landscape while significantly expanding the physical, technical and creative capacity of the campus. The new work includes a suite of professional rehearsal rooms and working spaces, building on existing music facilities by Arup Associates. The new project comprises a phased redevelopment of the former maltings buildings, the centrepiece of which is a new build orchestral rehearsal room, the Britten Studio, designed to complement the nearby concert hall. The room can be configured as a 350-seat recital hall for public use. A second workspace, the Jerwood Kiln Studio (converted from a derelict kiln building), can also accommodate 80 for public performances. Further practice rooms and support facilities have been formed within formerly derelict granaries. The central social space has been adapted from a storage barn sandwiched between older structures. Roof forms based on vernacular precedents and a palette of mellow reclaimed brick, reclaimed timber, concrete and Douglas Fir have been deployed to blend the new work into the existing spaces, extrapolating a process of accretion and gradual change that has been going on for over 150 years.

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ADDRESS SNAPE MALTINGS,
CLIENT
MALTINGS
SUFFOLK
SNAPE
350
& 80
CONCERT HALL & JERWOOD CAPACITY

“The 350-seater Britten Studio, which will surely come to rank as one of the most attractive spaces for chamber music in Britain.”

The Telegraph

350-seater Britten Studio, which will surely come to rank as one of the most attractive spaces for chamber music in Britain.”

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The @sohoplace auditorium marks a new departure for contemporary performance space. Responding to impresario Nica Burns’ vision for a truly adaptable, intimate 600 seat West End auditorium, Haworth Tompkins, Charcoalblue, Arup and Tait have designed an intense, sumptuous room with multiple possibilities for artists and audiences to explore. Embedded at the heart of a new building by architects Allford Hall Monaghan Morris, this project posed a radical challenge for the design team who were asked to deliver an adjustable thrust and in-the-round theatre, all within the tight spatial constraints of a dense Soho site. The answer is an innovative modular system of swing out arms and drop-in balcony cassettes, allowing the auditorium to be reconfigured using overhead lifting beams. The design was developed and reviewed in consultation with theatre show makers, first in model form through to full scale mock ups. Every inch of space was interrogated to give excellent sightlines from all seats. Balcony fronts in natural golden timber lend the space warmth and are acoustically modelled to both scatter sound sideways and reflect sound downwards back to the audience. These together with the inky blue seating continue the theatre’s colour scheme, set under a ‘starlit sky’ of house lighting. Noise and vibration from the Northern & Elizabeth lines below, and building directly above Crossrail infrastructure, brought significant acoustic and structural demands. The design solution houses the auditorium within a fully isolated acoustic box-in-box, isolating it from both noise and vibration. A set of state-of-the-art equipment including a large stage lift and trap room, overhead technical walkways, travelling bridges and a dedicated control room, completes the set up at @sohoplace - a highly adaptable, theatrically dense, acoustically precise and physically glamorous auditorium.

82 @sohoplace, 2022 ADDRESS SOHO PLACE, LONDON CLIENT DERWENT 602 CAPACITY
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“This place has the bare-bones simplicity of Shakespeare’s Globe but an even greater intimacy.”
Evening Standard

Theatre Royal Drury Lane, 2021 ADDRESS DRURY LANE, LONDON CLIENT LW THEATRES AUDITORIUM CAPACITY 1979

Theatre Royal Drury Lane is one of the world’s most important theatres, in operation since 1663. This project, for LW Theatres, has involved seven years of painstaking research, analysis, design and craftsmanship to bring London’s grandest venue back to life. A central part of the project vision was to reveal and restore the 1812 foyers and staircases and to democratise the previously segregated circulation into the auditorium. A new lift, along with fully accessible circulation at each level, has ensured that every audience member can now experience the grandeur of the architecture. New bars, retail space and furniture enable the theatre to operate viably throughout the day and evening. Wyatt’s multi-tiered, enveloping auditorium was replaced entirely in the 1920s when a more disengaged, cinematic style of seating arrangement was fashionable, so a crucial aspect of our work has been to bring the audience into a closer and more direct relationship with the stage. The redecorated auditorium has been fully re-seated and technically refitted so that for the first time it will be possible to arrange the theatre in unconventional formats for specific productions. With major technical renewal of the stagehouse, greatly increased restroom provision and full refurbishment of the dressing rooms, the entire building has been restored and upgraded.

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85
“The wait, and the investment, has been worth it. Staggeringly beautiful, the Lane – as it is affectionately referred to – is a gift to Theatreland and to future generations of theatregoers” The Stage

Ustinov Studio, 2008

Following successful completion of the Egg Theatre for children and young people, the Theatre Royal, Bath, commissioned Haworth Tompkins to renovate their ‘second space’, the Ustinov Studio. First, an improved public entrance and street presence were created. Inside, the foyer area was extensively remodelled so as to separate backstage and front of house areas. The existing performance space was transformed to create a flexible and technically sophisticated studio theatre adaptable for both spoken and musical performance. Improvement of the facilities for performers and technical staff was also a priority. Construction of wings and get-round provided full stage access. Circulation was rationalised to offer direct access to dressing rooms. Meanwhile, lighting bars were fitted to provide flexible stage lighting, and a fully-equipped control room was constructed at high level. Close collaboration with the client was vital to stretch an extremely tight budget to the limit. By making a virtue of this restriction, the aim has been to develop an architectural language which was warm and welcoming, but reflected the experimental nature of the studio’s work.

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ADDRESS SAWCLOSE, BATH CLIENT THEATRE ROYAL BATH AUDITORIUM CAPACITY 126

“I couldn’t be happier with the transformation from the old Ustinov to the new Ustinov, which is like having a brand new theatre. I’ve got the Ustinov we always wanted from the project ... an exciting, vibrant, welcoming space, a fully functioning ‘grown-up’ theatre and a real complement and partner to the wonderful ‘Egg’ children’s theatre.”

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Andrew Smaje

The Young Vic is a famous producing theatre in south London, originally designed in 1970 as an informal, temporary space for the National Theatre company. Thirty years later, the building had become physically dilapidated but the innovative thrust stage auditorium had proved a potent performance space and the old butchers shop foyer (a lone survivor of wartime bombing) an important vessel of communal memory. Haworth Tompkins re-imagined a new building around these two fragments, upgrading the auditorium and adding an enlarged foyer bar, two new studio theatres and much improved support spaces. Artist Clem Crosby painted the new auditorium façade, layered with aluminium mesh and uplit to create a theatrical gauze effect. The building is designed along passive low energy principles, combining high insulation levels, natural ventilation, shading and orientation to reduce the building’s carbon footprint. The ‘public’ and ‘private’ territories of the theatre as a whole are deliberately merged to heighten the sense of a shared democratic architecture – a place, to quote the artistic director David Lan, “...where strangers can meet in peace”. Since its opening the new Young Vic has become a central part of London’s cultural life and one of Europe’s most discussed theatres.

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ADDRESS THE CUT, LONDON CLIENT YOUNG VIC AUDITORIUM CAPACITY 550
Young Vic, 2006
91
“The building, which comes in on time and on budget, is a stupendous new theatre factory, with three distinct and distinctive auditoria….stunning, versatile new venues.” The Stage

In Progress

94 HaworthTompkins
95 The Old Vic

American Repertory Theater, 2026

research centre, a keystone of the university’s

auditoria, the building will be an experimental cultural space that aims to be an active participant in the lives of the entire community of its users, from local people to international artists. In order to provide A.R.T. with an adaptable, future-proof ‘test bed’ for making and experiencing performance, the project seeks to maximise flexibility and creative opportunity throughout the building. The concept of ‘rooms with no names’ has emerged in discussions with A.R.T. and describes the ability for both front and back of house spaces to support a range of uses at different times: public gathering and refreshment; informal performance; rehearsal; making/assembly and community use. A robust, democratic and inclusive visual and ,material language is being developed to encourage engagement and hard use, while an ambitious set of sustainability goals, (including the holistic Living Building Challenge Core certification) will result in a new, regenerative cultural architecture for the coming century of change. The exterior walls of the building will be a ‘canvas’ of temporary and permanent public art. Construction is programmed to begin in early 2023 with completion anticipated in 2026.

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ADDRESS
BOSTON, UNITED STATES CLIENT AMERICAN REPERTORY THEATER & HARVARD UNIVERSITY
Haworth Tompkins is working with the American Repertory Theater (A.R.T.) at Harvard University on a new performance and emerging masterplan in the Boston district of Allston. Anchored around two highly flexible

We are working with The Court Theatre and Christchurch City Council on a new venue in the city’s Performing Arts Precinct, part of the long urban rebuilding process after the terrible earthquake of 2011 . We have led the pubic consultation and concept design and are now collaborating with NZ architects Athfield to complete the design and construction of this keystone cultural building. The threestorey theatre is designed to be a welcoming, democratic and regenerative space, making maximum use of natural materials, ventilation and light. It will house two auditoria; a 365-seat main playhouse, and a 130-seat studio theatre, where children’s and family shows can be held. All aspects of a working theatre, including set-building, costume-making, rehearsals and administration, will be based on site, with plans to make these usually back-stage activities more visible to the public. The team are also working on the design for public space in the Performing Arts Precinct. A series of laneways will draw people to a central courtyard, which will be used for a range of outdoor performances. Our aim is to give the city a new cultural and communal heart. Construction began in 2022 and the theatre is due to open in 2024.

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The Court Theatre, 2024 ADDRESS CHRISTCHURCH, NEW ZEALAND CLIENT CHRISTCHURCH CITY COUNCIL & THE COURT THEATRE

Edith Cowan University, 2025

We are working with Perth-based Edith Cowan University on their City Campus project. We are assisting Lyons, our Australian partners, with the strategic campus masterplan, and focusing on the new home for the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts (WAAPA) within the City Campus. The new WAAPA will activate the northern block of the City Campus site, with a dynamic and welcoming entrance to draw in a diverse group of theatre patrons, visiting artists, university students and members of the community. The multilevel foyers incorporate new bars/cafes and catering facilities and have the infrastructure to facilitate impromptu performances and a provision for cross arts use combining student exhibition spaces within the ground floor foyer. Five new performance spaces of varying capacity and form will enable WAAPA to stage the full spectrum of their performing arts work in professional world class venues and develop an ambitious new artistic, research and educational programme. A series of teaching spaces, ranging from large rehearsal rooms and studios to ensemble and practice rooms, will support artistic development. Embedding WAAPA into the City Campus will ensure that a diverse range of ECU’s students and Perth’s wider community can experience both “front of house” aspects and “behind the scenes” glimpses of the extraordinary work that happens at this leading conservatoire.

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ADDRESS PERTH, WESTERN AUSTRALIA CLIENT
WAAPA & EDITH COWAN UNIVERSITY

technology, is opening in January with David Hockney’s new show Bigger & Closer. Hockney will use the innovative venue to take the audience on a personal journey through his art, featuring iconic paintings alongside some rarely seen pieces, and some newly created work. This will be the first in a repertoire of original shows made with leading artists and innovators. Located on Lewis Cubitt Square in a building by Allford Hall Monaghan Morris, Lightroom was designed as a sister space to the Bridge Theatre which opened in 2017. The generous foyer will contain a café/bar run in collaboration with St John, a gift shop, and seating both in the foyer and outside on the square.

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Lightroom, 2023 ADDRESS LEWIS CUBITT SQUARE, LONDON CLIENT LONDON THEATRE COMPANY AND 59 PRODUCTIONS
Haworth Tompkins has been working with the London Theatre Company and 59 Productions on Lightroom, their new venue in King’s Cross dedicated to artist-led immersive shows. Lightroom, a four-storey space equipped with the latest digital projection and audio

Haworth Tompkins is working with the Liverpool Playhouse on a Capital Refurbishment Feasibility Study that will safeguard the future of the 156-year-old theatre. We will be leading a multi-disciplinary team including Liverpool based architects MGMA, Charcoalblue as Theatre Consultants, Layer Studio as Landscape Architects, Local Engagement by Placed along with regular collaborators Skelly & Couch, Price & Myers and Gardiner & Theobald. Following on from our work with the Liverpool and Merseyside Theatre’s Trust on the Stirling Prize-winning Everyman, this Feasibility Study is looking at how a refurbishment of the Playhouse could be an exemplar for similar age theatres across the world, demonstrating that you can improve the environmental credentials of a listed building and its accessibility, while also acting as a catalyst for a cultural regeneration of its surrounding area. The team will begin work immediately, building on our existing knowledge of the theatres and the city region, with the report due in Spring 2023.

100
ADDRESS WILLIAMSON
CLIENT LIVERPOOL
THEATRES TRUST
Liverpool Playhouse, 2023
SQUARE, LIVERPOOL
& MERSEYSIDE

MalmÖ Stadsteater, 2023

Malmö Hippodromen was built in 1898 as a dedicated circus amphitheatre. Malmö Stadsteater currently operates three stages, the largest of which is housed in the historic building - located within a city block separated from the street by a row of shop fronts and restaurants. Our refurbishment project reconnects the auditorium to the street by creating a new link building that part-covers an existing courtyard. This space provides an informal events space as well as connection between a new theatre street entrance, café & workshop space and the refurbished theatre foyers. The auditorium is completely redesigned within the retained historic circus shell, increasing capacity by over 100 seats up to a maximum of 520 seated audience in a variety of formats using a combination of repositionable seats and retractable rostra & bleachers, as well as a fully demountable and adjustable proscenium. The material aesthetic is durable and expressive of each material’s natural characteristics, including reclaimed cotton from denim clothing reprocessed as acoustic felt, refurbished ‘as found’ concrete floor surfaces, Swedish pine plywood joinery, visible fir timber floor joists, recycled rubber sheet flooring and restored brickwork. Construction work commenced in summer 2021, coordinated by our delivery partners in Malmö, White Arkitekter. The theatre is reopening in February 2023 with A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

101
ADDRESS KALENDEGATAN,
CLIENT
STADSTEATER
MALM Ö
MALM Ö

The Old Vic Annex is a new build six-storey extension to the rear of the famous Grade II* listed theatre in London’s Waterloo. The new building is designed to be a welcoming destination for the local community as well as a much-needed expansion of the theatre’s working and engagement spaces. The new accommodation will include a sunny, double height street café, a Clore Learning Centre for education and participation activities, a script library, a rooftop event space and a new green room. The works will also involve remodelling of the existing back of house spaces to achieve a fully accessible stage door, improved dressing rooms and staff offices and the refurbishment of the existing rehearsal room to include a studio theatre space. This will all support The Old Vic’s social mission as an accessible theatre for staff, artists, audience, students, and the wider local community. The principles of sustainability and regenerative design have informed the intelligent re-use of the existing building and the design of an exemplar low-carbon extension, incorporating a timber frame, natural ventilation and solar shading formed of repurposed theatre lighting components. The overall site works began in June 2022 with completion programmed for Spring 2024.

102
ADDRESS THE CUT, WATERLOO, LONDON CLIENT THE OLD VIC
The Old Vic, 2024

incorporate a number of other

At the heart of the project is a new 1570 seat auditorium, a grand proscenium house in the classical tradition with three main seating levels, contained within sumptuously painted wall linings. Our aim is to achieve a level of contact and intimacy normally associated with much smaller capacity spaces. The principal foyer is arranged vertically on multiple levels, each with its own interval bar, around a dramatic central atrium with horseshoe balconies overlooking the lower levels and outward to the city beyond. Entrance and arrival spaces serve both the street level and a raised thoroughfare that forms the spine of the new development. The accommodation is completed by a full suite of dressing rooms and technical back of house spaces. This complex project is scheduled to complete in 2026.

103
ADDRESS OLYMPIA, LONDON CLIENT TRAFALGAR ENTERTAINMENT AUDITORIUM CAPACITY 1570
Olympia Theatre, 2026
Haworth Tompkins are collaborating with Heatherwick Studios on a new theatre building in west London. When complete it will be the largest new permanent London theatre since the National Theatre in 1976. Operated by Trafalgar Entertainment Group, the theatre building will ancillary uses and is part of a wider redevelopment of the famous Olympia exhibition centre.

Pembroke College, Cambridge 2023

The light-touch conversion of the former Emmanuel United Reform Church to a flexible performance and lecture space forms part of the proposed expansion of Pembroke College within the Old Press Mill Lane site in central Cambridge. The church was built in 1874 to designs by Architect James Cubitt. The comprehensive refurbishment will retain the architectural primacy of the original fabric, form and finishes, while introducing new services and technical infrastructure to enhance the flexibility and acoustic characteristics of the space. New bespoke seating will provide 160-170 seats for lectures and recitals and can be removed for exams, dances and other events. Flexible staging also allows for an expandable stage area to accommodate larger groups of musicians. New heating and ventilation and secondary glazing will substantially reduce the energy load of the new venue and enable the Church to connect to the site-wide fossilfuel free services infrastructure. A new, timber framed foyer and study space connects the church to a new public courtyard and to Trumpington St via a new gate lodge and gallery space, incorporating an existing house. Works commenced on site in June 2021, and will complete in 2023.

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Theatr Clwyd, 2024

Sited on a hillside above the town of Mold in North Wales, Theatr Clywd’s home is a mid-70s arts complex originally designed to house both theatre and TV production spaces. 50 years on, the red brick building is in urgent need of reconfiguration and upgrading. We have been working closely with Flintshire County Council and the Theatr Clywd team to open up the theatre more fully to its wonderful landscape, repurpose the existing fabric and replace only what is essential to enable the organisation to expand its role as Wales’ biggest producing house as well as the cultural centrepiece of the region. The client and design team spent many months in research, consultation and technical option studies to maximise the cultural capacity of the building at the practical minimum embodied and operational carbon cost. Once complete, the theatre will provide multiple possibilities for performance, music and community support uses throughout the day and throughout the year. With a programme of extensive tree planting, green walls, roof planting and extensive on-site PVs we aim to contribute to hitting a whole life zero carbon target and for this project to be an exemplar of 21st century cultural space. COUNTY COUNCIL

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Performing Arts Project Awards 2022-2000

Georgian Group Award, Restoration of a Georgian Building in an Urban Setting: Theatre Royal Drury Lane

Chicago Athenaeum, International Architecture Award: Theatre Royal Drury Lane

Civic Trust AABC Conservation Award, Highly Commended: Theatre Royal Drury Lane

The Stage Awards, Theatre Building of the Year: Theatre Royal Drury Lane

The Worshipful Company of Tylers and Bricklayers: Roof Slating and Tiling Award: Battersea Arts Centre

Civic Trust National Award, Highly Commended: Bristol Old Vic

Civic Trust Selwyn Goldsmith Award for Universal Design, Highly Commended: Bristol Old Vic

New London Architecture Awards, Overall Winner: Battersea Arts Centre

New London Architecture Awards, Community Prize: Battersea Arts Centr

New London Architecture Awards, Experiencing Culture: Battersea Arts Centre

Chicago Athenaeum, International Architecture Award: Peter Hall Performing Arts Centre

USITT Architecture Award: Bristol Old Vic

Civic Trust AABC Conservation Award: Battersea Arts Centre

Wood Award: Battersea Arts Centre

Chicago Athenaeum, International Architecture Award: Battersea Arts Centre

Chicago Athenaeum, International Architecture Award: Bristol Old Vic

RIBA National Award: Peter Hall Performing Arts Centre

RIBA National Award: Bristol Old Vic

RIBA National Award: Battersea Arts Centre

RICS South West Building Conservation Award: Bristol Old Vic

RICS South West Project of the Year: Bristol Old Vic

RIBA South West Conservation Award: Bristol Old Vic

RIBA South West Building of the Year Award: Bristol Old Vic

RIBA London Award: Battersea Arts Centre

BD Refurbishment Architect of the Year: Bristol Old Vic, Battersea Arts Centre, Theatre Royal Drury Lane

Bristol LABC Building Excellence Award, Best Commercial Project: Bristol Old Vic

The Stage Awards, Theatre Building of the Year: Battersea Arts Centre

RIBA London Award: The Bridge Theatre

RICS London Award, Design through Innovation: The Bridge Theatre

BD Public Building Architect of the Year: Bridge Theatre, Bush Theatre, Bristol Old Vic

The Stage Awards, Theatre Building of the Year: Bridge Theatre

Hammersmith Society Conservation Award: The Bush Theatre

RICS National Award: National Theatre - NT Future

Chicago Athenaeum, International Architectural Award: Chichester Festival Theatre

Chicago Athenaeum, International Architectural Award: Everyman Theatre

RICS London Award: National Theatre - NT Future

The Stage Awards, Theatre Building of the Year - NT Future

Civic Trust Award: National Theatre - NT Future

CIBS Building Performance Champion: Everyman Theatre

CIBS Project of the Year - Leisure: Everyman Theatre

USITT Architecture Award: Everyman Theatre

World Interior News Award: Everyman Theatre

RIBA Client of the Year: National Theatre

New London Award Public Building: National Theatre - NT Future

New London Award Commissioning Excellence: National Theatre - NT Future

RIBA National Award: National Theatre - NT Future

RIBA London Award: National Theatre - NT Future

RIBA London Award: Donmar Dryden Street

RICS South East Conservation Highly Commended: Chichester Festival Theatre

RIBA South East Building of the Year Award: Chichester Festival Theatre

RIBA South East Award: Chichester Festival Theatre

RIBA South East Project Architect of the Year Award

RIBA South East Conservation Award: Chichester Festival Theatre

RIBA South East Sustainability Award: Chichester Festival Theatre

Civic Trust Award: Everyman Theatre, Liverpool

Civic Trust Commendation: Chichester Festival Theatre

The Stage Theatre Building of the Year: Everyman Theatre, Liverpool

RIBA Stirling Prize: Everyman Theatre, Liverpool

RIBA London Architect of the Year

Building Design Architect of the Year: Gold Award

Building Design Architect of the Year: Public Building

Building Design Architect of the Year: Refurbishment

Chicago Athenaeum, International Architectural Award: NT Shed

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RIBA North West Building of the Year Award: Everyman Theatre, Liverpool

RIBA National Award: Everyman Theatre, Liverpool

RIBA London Award: NT Shed

WAN International Performing Space Award: Everyman Theatre, Liverpool

Chicago Athenaeum, International Architectural Award: Young Vic Theatre

AIA UK Award: NT Shed

German Gold Design Award: NT Shed

Civic Trust Pro Tem Special Award: NT Shed Civic Trust Award: NT Shed

AIA UK Honorable Mention: Everyman Theatre, Liverpool

Architizer A+ Award: NT Shed

Civic Trust Commendation: Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre

New London Award: Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre

New London Award: NT Shed

Chicago Athenaeum, International Architectural Award: Snape Maltings

Civic Trust Award: Snape Maltings

RIBA Stirling Prize Midlist: Aldeburgh Music Creative Campus

Quality of Place Award - Conservation: Aldeburgh Music Creative Campus

RIBA East Award: Aldeburgh Music Creative Campus

RICS East of England Conservation Award: Snape Maltings

Architects Journal Small Project Award: Dovecote Studio

British Construction Industry Building Award: Young Vic Theatre

Chicago Athenaeum, International Architectural Award: Young Vic Theatre

RIBA Stirling Prize Midlist: North Wall Performing Arts Centre

RIBA National Award: North Wall Performing Arts Centre

RIBA South Award: North Wall Performing Arts Centre

RIBA South Conservation Award: North Wall Performing Arts Centre

Prime Minister’s Public Building Award (Finalist): National Theatre Studio

AIA/UK Award: Young Vic Theatre

Civic Trust Award: Young Vic Theatre

Civic Trust Award: North Wall Performing Arts Centre Building Award: Shortlisted Practice of the Year

LEAF Public Building of the Year Award: Young Vic Theatre

RIBA South Conservation Commendation: North Wall Performing Arts Centre

Evening Standard Special Award for Innovative Theatre Architecture

RIBA Stirling Prize Shortlist: Young Vic Theatre

RIBA London Award: Young Vic Theatre

RIBA London Building of the Year: Young Vic Theatre

RIBA National Award: Young Vic Theatre

USITT Award with Honour: The Egg Theatre, Bath

USITT Award with Merit: Young Vic Theatre

Structural Steel Design Award Merit : Young Vic Theatre

RIBA Stirling Prize Midlist: The Egg Theatre, Bath

RIBA Wessex Award: The Egg Theatre, Bath

B&NES Design Quality Award: The Egg Theatre, Bath

ABTT Prague Quadrennial Gold Award for Theatre Design

Time Out Live Awards - Most Inspiring Venue: Almeida Kings Cross Building Awards: Young Architect of The Year

Outstanding Young UK Architect, Royal Fine Art Commission Awards

IStructE Award: Royal Court Theatre

RIBA London Award: Royal Court Theatre

RBKC Conservation and Restoration Award: Royal Court Theatre

USITT Award (USA): Royal Court Theatre

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Performance Project Clients

59 Productions

Almeida Theatre

Ambassador Theatre Group

American Repertory Theater

Battersea Arts Centre

Bristol Old Vic Bush Theatre

Chichester Festival Theatre

Donmar Warehouse

Edith Cowan University English Stage Company

Etat for Utbygging, Bergen, Norway

Everyman and Playhouse Theatres

Harvard University

King Edward’s School, Birmingham Lloyd Webber Theatres

London Theatre Company

MalmÖ Stadsteater

MM! The Party National Theatre

Nimax Theatres

Pembroke College, University of Cambridge Punchdrunk

Regent’s Park Theatre

Royal Exchange Theatre

Rugby School

Snape Maltings

St Edward’s School, Oxford St John’s Smith Square

Tall Stories

The Court Theatre, New Zealand

The Old Vic

The Perse School

The Young Vic Company

Theatr Clwyd

Theatre Royal, Bath Theatre Royal Stratford East Trafalgar Entertainment Group

Everyman Theatre The Den

The North Wall Arts Centre

The Shed

King Edwards School

Battersea Arts Centre The Egg

Image Credits

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Helene Binet Alex Brenner Andy Chopping Manuel Harlan Fred Howarth David Jensen Danny Lane Chris Payne Philip Vile National Theatre Dorfman Theatre
Royal
Court Theatre
Donmar
Dryden Street
Chichester
Festival Theatre
Bush
Theatre
Peter
Hall Performing Arts Centre Almeida Kings Cross National Theatre Studio Snape Maltings Ustinov Theatre Bridge Theatre Royal Court Theatre Upstairs Donmar Warehouse
Young
Vic Almeida Gainsborough
Bristol
Old Vic Theatre Royal Drury Lane
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110 HaworthTompkins 33 Greenwood Place, London, NW5 1LB +44 (0) 20 7250 3225, info@haworthtompkins.com