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Danish community theatre receives a much needed sprucing up from COBE
Taastrup Theater in Copenhagen has recently undergone a renovation and extension project, courtesy of architecture firm COBE. The key focus of the project was to improve the building’s communication with the surrounding area – a social housing neighbourhood in Taastrup. Originally constructed in the 1970s as a local community theatre, an opportunity arose to bring the bland concrete form back to life and to generate new links between the building and the local community.
Wrapped around the existing structure is a fresh façade formed of translucent acrylic prisms which allow the glow from the theatre’s interior to be projected out throughout the evening. Also, when tickets and outsold or the show is in progress, red lights under the façade broadcast this fact to the nearby square. This robust prismatic façade not only encases the existing building but creates a new open plan foyer, arrival area and café space, connecting the formerly enclosed interior to the outside.
A number of gates have been installed within the structure between the foyer and theatre space, allowing the structure to work as one coherent flowing space or separately as two distinct areas. Staff flow is optimised by merging the bar, box office and administration area, allowing all three services to be run by a single person, whilst the restrooms and café have been redistributed onto the first floor to ensure that the ground level is reserved for all non-technical functions.
The renovation of the interior space was influenced heavily by children’s associations with theatre, i.e. gold colouration, mirror pixel tiles and crystal chandeliers, contrasted with modern elements such as fluorescent lighting, an RGB bar and chairs designed by Paustian.
Taastrup Theater is shortlisted for WAF2010 in the category New and Old.
Sian Disson
News Editor
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