Architect Team "Space Group (N) / Brisac Gonzalez (UK)" has won a joint first place in the international architectural competition to design the new opera and culture house in Kristiansund, with the project "Silencio". The team shares the prize with "CF Møller Architects (N)" and their project "Kulturkvartalet". Silencio consists of 15 000 m2 opera and cultural house with 600-seat auditorium, library, cultural facilities, restaurants and youth center. Jarmund / Vigsnæs AS Architects, MNAL / Wingårdh architect's office, North Plan / 70 North / Mestre Wåge Arquitectes and Snøhetta AS also participated in the competition.

Kristiansund Opera and Cultural Centre, rendering courtesy Luxigon

SILENCIO
The complex represents culture in its most pervasive and innovative form. To create spaces for the unexpected, spaces to inspire us, spaces where the collective and individual can coexist, to inspire experimentation, invention, heterogeneity and freedom, is to liberate culture.

OVERTURE
By amalgamating opera, library, school, voluntary cultural facilities, youth center, the nytt Opera- og Kulturhus Kristiansund represents culture in its most pervasive and innovative form. To create spaces for the unexpected, spaces to inspire us, spaces where the collective and individual can coexist, to inspire experimentation, invention, heterogeneity and freedom is to liberate culture.

Kristiansund Opera and Cultural Centre, rendering courtesy Luxigon

URBAN
There are already two significant buildings on the site – Langveien ungdomskole and Folketshus. To engulf them by a third larger structure will be detrimental, diminishing the integrity of the existing buildings. OKK overcomes the challenges of architectural blurring by introducing a 'new' building on the site – liberated and yet connected, complimenting the original vision of the Pedersen plan.

RED CARPET
A procession of movement from entry to restaurant, via The Red Carpet that weaves it way through the building, reveals at once both the rich interior setting and views of Kristiansund. This spatially rich social mixer takes you to all public accessible spaces – in addition to being a space for impromptu performance, reception, cafe and information centre.

Kristiansund Opera and Cultural Centre, rendering courtesy Space Group / Brisac Gonzalez

THE HALL
Our objective is simple: allow for the greatest number of guests to be as close as possible to the stage, and with perfect sightlines. From the stage, the performers shall see an ocean of people, from wall-to-wall.

Our design for the main hall envisions a fluid framework of wooden coffers that gives continuity in the reading of space, and flexibility in the acoustical definition – tune ability – of the room. The auditorium is flexible, yet it is not generic. Rather a space of multiple states of completeness.

SNEAK PREVIEW
The fly tower floats, giving rise to an instance where the city and the performance intermingle: a glimpse into the world where fantasy is constructed – a backstage pass for everyone. Sneak Previews afford surprising moments where house, front of house, and back-of-house intermingle.

ROOM WITH A VIEW
On the top floor of the new building restaurant, canteen and orchestra rehearsal room can be combined to create a very large room with spectacular views. An expansive exterior terrace adds greater flexibility in a setting where different scenarios, be they planned, impromptu, or incidental can occur.

FACE
The OKK façade is a curtain to the performance within. From the exterior the perception is of a soft dress, covered in small reflective sequins, shimmering, constantly changing, and flowing.

From the inside, the lighting varies from translucent to transparent, providing an even light throughout the building. The performance remains in focus and the day lighting contributes to the choreography of spaces.

KNOWLEDGE
Folketshus awaits a new future. Our strategy is threefold: a full refurbishment of the building skin, an upgrading of the structure, and an extension of the top floor with roof terrace. The ground floor is conceived as a living room, with spaces for music, newspapers, studying, playing. The café opens graciously to Kongensplass – an urban garden

Kristiansund Opera and Cultural Centre - Floor plans, drawing courtesy Space Group / Brisac Gonzalez

+ Project credits / data

Project: Kristiansund Opera and Cultural Centre
Location: Kristiansund, Norway
Function: opera, library, voluntary cultural facilities, college, conference hall, offices
Site area: 5.800 m2
Bldg area: 3.200 m2
Total floor area: 15.100 m2
Landscape area: 2.600 m2
Stories: 7
Structure: concrete, steel

Design Participation:

SPACE GROUP
Gary Bates, Gro Bonesmo, Adam Kurdahl, Wenche Andreassen
Gesine Gummi, Sassi Heiskanen, Ingjerd Sandven Kleivan, Tudor Vlascenau
Naofumi Namba, Jens Niehues, Jens Noach, Rebekah Schaberg, Erich Gerlach, Claudia Laarmann

BRISAC GONZALEZ
Edgar Gonzalez, João Baptista
Eleftherios Ambatzis, Miguel Gonçalves, Husain Joarawala, Gordon Swapp

Client: Kongens Plass Eigendom AS and Kristiansund Kommune

Rendering:
Luxigon
Eric de Broche des Combes, Laurent Ménabé

Landscape design:
Sundt og Thomassen AS
Trygve Sundt, Marianne Thomassen, Knut Andreas Øyvang

Structural engineer:
Adams Kara Taylor
Paul Scott, Rob Partridge, Clemens Neugart

Stage mechanics:
DUCKS scéno
Frans Swarte, Michel Cova, Alina Delgadillo, Anelyse Duperrier

Acoustics:
Norconsult AS / Akustikon
Enno Swets, Jan-Inge Gustafsson

Building Services:
Atelier Ten
Patrick Bellew, Rudolph Duncan-Bosu

+ About Architects

SPACE GROUP

SPACE GROUP (Etbl. 1999, Oslo) is an award-winning architecture and design office – with a broad international expertise that attack both large and small projects with the same ambition. Strategic and innovative, flexible and direct. Ongoing projects include: Oslo Central Station; 80,000 m2 including the new station, hotel, Station, Office, offices and shopping. In Trondheim, a new 400-seat roms/1400 conference hotel under construction. And in Bodø is the construction of the new headquarters for the Civil Aviation Authority started.

The office is headed by three partners: Gro Bonesmo, Adam Kurdahl and Gary Bates.

Space Group partner Gary Bates, says: – The merger of activities in Kristiansund Opera and culture represent culture at its most radical and innovative.

We are delighted to have won, and look forward to realizing this project. Our project is well developed, and we are confident that Kristiansunds population will be satisfied and enjoy their new opera and culture far into the future.

BRISAC GONZALEZ

BRISAC GONZALEZ (Etbl. 1999, London) is an award-winning international architectural practice based in London. Recent and current projects include: a sports hall under construction in downtown Paris, a 11 000 m2 of music and artist school in the south of France. In Scandinavia, work the practice of a feasibility study for the museum in Copenhagen and its 8000 m2 new premises. Brisac Gonzalez has recently been nominated to draw a mixed use facility including 100 homes in the city of Paris.

Edgar Gonzalez, a partner in Brisac Gonzalez, says: – OKK a very interesting project. Not only because of the wide range of activities in new and existing structures, but due. a very unique relationship with our Norwegian colleagues. I am happy to work with another Scandinavian project. We have worked in Sweden before, and is currently working on a feasibility study in the historic center of Copenhagen.

+ Project description, images and drawings courtesy of Space Group / Brisac Gonzalez, Adams Kara Taylor and Luxigon

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Turner© has a warm and cosy shine which replaces tea light. The wind will never blow out Turner© and the LED’s do not attract insects.

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+ Designer: Onoe Design

Turner©, image courtesy Onoe Design

Turner©, image courtesy Onoe Design