New World Symphony Campus Expansion

Florida’s first Frank Gehry buildingNWS has commissioned architect Frank Gehry to design a groundbreaking expansion of its campus. The new complex will be a music lab for music education and innovation and dramatically increase NWS’ ability to fulfill its mission of preparing gifted graduates of prestigious music programs for careers with symphony orchestras and ensembles. The campus expansion will address constraints posed by NWS’ current home, the Lincoln Theatre, such as a severe shortage of rehearsal and practice space and sub-par acoustics. The heart of the facility will be a technologically and acoustically sophisticated music laboratory for rehearsals, web casting and performances. The building will face a new, public park and feature a large outside video screen that will project the educational activities that are at the core of New World Symphony. The complex will be situated on the city blocks bounded by Lincoln Lane, Pennsylvania, Washington Avenues and 17th Street.The new facility’s recording, broadcasting and web casting infrastructure, fully wired with next generation Internet 2, will expand NWS’ reach and educational mission, enabling NWS to connect with millions of young people, students and educators throughout the United States and around the world to share, explore and evolve the heritage of classical music. An innovative see-through architecture and a flexible, open-access configuration of the rehearsal and performance space will create new ways of engaging audiences and the local community. Large in-door video screens will allow for experimentation with new visual presentations accompanying performances. The project constitutes a unique collaboration between Frank Gehry and Michael Tilson Thomas. New World Symphony’s campus expansion will be Florida’s first Frank Gehry building. The Gehry building currently nearest to Miami is the Vontz Center for Molecular Studies in Cincinnati, Ohio. The performance section of the music lab will seat approx. 700, the same number as the Lincoln Theatre. Projected square footage of the entire facility is approx. 90,000. Construction is scheduled to commence in mid-2007 and to be completed in early 2010. For more information, please call: 305.673.3330