The Arden Theatre Company's new F. Otto Haas Stage is a dramatic reuse of an existing building in Old City, Philadelphia. Dating to the late 19th century, the structure has housed various occupants over the years, including a technical trade school, marine equipment warehouse and postal facility. The building is constructed masonry at the exterior and a heavy timber structure at the interior. Prior to the renovation, the theater space was divided horizontally by a second floor and vertically by wood columns on an eighteen-foot grid.
The Arden Theatre Company's new F. Otto Haas Stage is a dramatic reuse of an existing building in Old City, Philadelphia. Dating to the late 19th century, the structure has housed various occupants over the years, including a technical trade school, marine equipment warehouse and postal facility. The building is constructed masonry at the exterior and a heavy timber structure at the interior. Prior to the renovation, the theater space was divided horizontally by a second floor and vertically by wood columns on an eighteen-foot grid.
This existing space was surveyed and studied in order to select the ideal volume for the new theater from the point of view of both theatrical production and architectural design. As a large "black box theater" for 375, the new space was not intended to have a fixed stage nor fixed audience seating. The proportions of the new theater, therefore, allow for complete flexibility in audience-to-stage layout as well as set design and lighting, all within the constraints of the existing building.
The guiding principle for the project was to yield a fully flexible space defined by its systems and the character of the existing warehouse-like building. Unlike a proscenium theater, where plays are viewed through a "window" from within a decorated hall, the Haas Stage allows any and all parts of the room to be occupied by the play. In a sense, it is a traditional theater turned inside out. The audience is brought back stage, while the actors emerge into the house. The result is a space that serves as a background for theater; the plays themselves define the foreground.
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