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CHS Community Post | New ampitheater for Volunteer Park moving forward – Architectural team hired

spp56-editedVolunteer Park Trust (VPT) has been working with Seattle Parks and the local community to replace the dilapidated performance stage in Volunteer Park. VPT has now hired an experienced architectural team to conduct a feasibility study exploring community preferences and technical requirements for a new amphitheater. Design phase for the project is scheduled to begin in the summer of 2016. ORA Architects will direct the study with Walker Macy Landscape Architects. ORA Lead Architect Owen Richards, AIA, is well known for his work on McCaw Hall. Walker Macy has extensive public outdoor performance space experience.

The stage is a vital part of Volunteer Park’s infrastructure and is widely used for performances, festivals, and community celebrations. The current brick structure, built in 1971, is in poor condition and its replacement is long overdue. Among its many inadequacies are bad acoustics, inadequate backstage space, and absence of weather protection. The stage lacks fundamental features needed to successfully present music, theatre, dance, film, and other events.

The $20,000 year-long study is VPT’s first step toward creating a replacement amphitheater. The study is funded by the City of Seattle Neighborhood Matching Fund, and is being managed by the VPT Amphitheater Project Task Force, a group of neighbors and community volunteers committed to improving the park.

VPT will hold a public meeting to answer questions and seek community input on Thursday, October 15th from 6-8:00 PM in the Seattle Asian Art Museum auditorium in Volunteer Park.

For detailed information on the park, its history, Volunteer Park Trust, and the Amphitheater Project please see the RFQ. Link to the RFQ: http://volunteerparktrust.org/performance-space.html

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Kikjou Delatour
8 years ago

I would like to politely point out that an amphitheatre is a both-sided (amphi) theatre and hence it is round. What you are referring to is, at best, a theatre. The latter being, in classical Rome, an orange wedge-shaped performance space with spectators sitting on the round side and the stage on the straight side.

Park neighbor
Park neighbor
8 years ago

Hi, I wonder if you will be adding a shell around it that might project the sound from the stage forward better at the same time as preventing sound from polluting the entire park and the neighborhood to the west of the park. Just an idea, since during the summer, there are entire days where many people who don’t necessarily want to listen to a booming bass line all day are forced to.

mitchell
mitchell
8 years ago
Reply to  Park neighbor

The technology in sound amplification these days is so sophisticated and evolved that even though the audience may be in a radius of 200 feet, technicians enjoy tweaking the volume controls so that festivities may be enjoyed by all within half a mile.
No gun owner is going to keep an AK47 cooped up in a cupboard without letting off a few rounds from time to time.

Park neighbor
Park neighbor
8 years ago
Reply to  mitchell

No kidding. Listening to Bumbershoot from inside my closed-windowed house on Capitol Hill right now. Sigh.

A&T
A&T
8 years ago

Woot, woot, Owen! It will be great.

harvey
harvey
8 years ago

Anyone concerned with noise should go to the meeting. From what I hear, it’s going to be a lot worse than it is now. The neighbors in all directions here the booming for 10 hrs. a day during the summer.

Park neighbor
Park neighbor
8 years ago
Reply to  harvey

Oh, no! What did you hear?

harvey
harvey
8 years ago
Reply to  Park neighbor

Just musings from people I know well informed about this project. Also beware of a movement to re-open the road behind the lawn, reservoir, tennis courts.

Park neighbor
Park neighbor
8 years ago
Reply to  harvey

Please post if you hear more about any of this. It took so long to close that road down, and it is so much nicer and safer now. It used to be a toxic mess there in the morning, with all these men sitting in their cars with the engines running.

Hattie
Hattie
8 years ago

What will be done to prevent the continuous tagging that the current stage suffers?