Project of the month: Performing arts centre, Plymouth University

The House’s exterior incorporates standing seam copper and locally sourced Plymouth limestone. Photographs: Christopher Heaney

South-west based contractor Midas Group has completed a £7m performing arts centre named The House for Plymouth University on its city-centre campus.

The centrepiece of the 1,540 sq m building, designed by architecture practice Burwell Deakins, is a double-height 200-capacity auditorium. Alongside the theatre a three-storey structure contains a public foyer, reception and feature staircase on the ground floor, rehearsal spaces and changing rooms on the first floor, with offices and sound rooms above.

Constructed with a lightweight steel frame, the building’s skin is made from standing seam copper, the same material as the university’s Roland Levinsky arts centre opposite. It is also clad in locally sourced Plymouth limestone, a traditional building material in the city. An 11 x 6.5m external screen, integrated into the building’s south facade, will be used to screen live performances to the public.

The centrepiece of the building is the double-height, 200-seat theatre auditorium

The facility is designed to be inclusive to performers, audiences and technical students – a tension grid over the entire theatre space allows full wheelchair access to the lighting and sound equipment and multi-level access to theatre spaces.

The scheme uses a natural ventilation strategy and is designed with extended labyrinth intakes to minimise break-in noise. This is used in combination with exposed pre-cast concrete soffits, phase-change materials and connections to the central CHP plant to achieve a BREEAM Excellent rating for the building.

A range of undergraduate and postgraduate programmes in dance, theatre and music will be taught at The House, which also has a fully sprung floor.

Adam Benjamin, lecturer in theatre and performance at the university, says: “The House is probably the best middle-scale dance venue in the country – the sort of provision I associate with Japan or France and really quite astonishing for a British university.”

A feature staircase is the focus of the ground floor public spaces (above left); public reception areas are accompanied by technical and administrative space (above right)