Location: Rotterdam, Netherlands.

Architect: Atelier Kempe Thill.

The Laurenskerk cathedral square in Rotterdam was left vacant after bombing attacks in World War II destroyed most of the surrounding buildings. The lack of commercial activity and mediocre buildings gave the square a lacklustre appearance. In 2004, a non-profit organization suggested the insertion of a small pavilion-theatre to programmatically organize the space and reinforce its physical limits. A call for entries was made, and a project was chosen, with over a million euros earmarked for its construction. The pavilion was designed for performances of theatrical works and consists of two cubic nuclei resting on a podium and supporting a slab 50 cm thick and thirty metres long. The result is a great horizontal portico framing a stage that is open on both sides. A seventy-metre-long sliding curtain hanging from the perimeter of the roof means that performances can be addressed to audiences on the square side or the canal side and it can even be run round both sides to make a closed-in room. The lateral nuclei contain storage room, toilets and an artists’ dressing room. The pavilion-cum-theatre revitalizes the Laurenskerk cathedral square and articulates its relationship with the Delftsevaart canal. The pavilion rises as an ambivalent body, thanks to the transparency of its structure and the mutability of its vertical closing by means of the sliding curtain. It can act as an opaque limit to reinforce the limit of the Grotekerkplein or become a threshold significantly connecting the square with the Delftsevaart canal. Overall, the pavilion provides a new focus for events and adds dynamism to the previously lacklustre square.

Photo credit: Architektur-Fotografie Ulrich Schwarz.