Subsequent progress has been so swift that, seven months before opening night, the project’s leadership has now publicly committed to a hard October completion date. “We have had the great success to raise $550 million to build the project,” says Katherine Farley, the chair of the board of Lincoln Center. “And we’re continuing, thanks to the goodwill of New Yorkers and the enthusiasm of our supporters, to raise a little more.”
What’s Inside
Those supporters will discover a totally new interior. In the lobby, the box office will be removed in favor of a general purpose welcome center on the Broadway side of the ground floor. “If you remember the old David Geffen Hall, you remember coming through this space, and it was quite transactional,” says Timms.
In its stead, the lobby’s floorspace will double, leaving room for a lounge, bar, food concessions, and most promising, a 50-foot-wide screen (dubbed “the Digital Stage” by the Philharmonic), which will livestream performances to members of the public, who can wander in to watch, free of charge. “When the New York Philharmonic is playing, you can walk by, get a cup of coffee, and bring your kids,” Timms continues.
During off hours, the screen will serve as a showcase for digital art works, which will be commissioned with guidance from the Public Art Fund and the Studio Museum in Harlem.
The escalators to the second floor’s Grand Promenade have been moved to the building’s sides, adding significant space to the main reception area, where there will be seating, a black granite bar, and access to the building’s picturesque outdoor terrace.
Decoration in the public spaces will also change: Ceilings will be a deep blue, and the walls will be decorated in a motif reminiscent of falling petals. The same motif will extend to the seats in the revised auditorium.
The new auditorium design removes 538 seats, chopping its total capacity to 2,200, as originally intended. Fisher Dachs Associates, the theater design consultant, advised on sightlines and the seating configuration.
The stage will be moved forward by 25 feet. This will not only allow seat placements closer to the stage, but also wrap some seats around the orchestra in what is known as “vineyard style” design. Parts of the stage will be able to rise out of the floor, expanding performance space, or submerge, expanding audience capacity. Sightlines have been improved by steepening the rake of the hall.
The most notable change will probably be to the hall’s acoustics, completely revamped by design firm Akustiks, using custom, rippling, and channeled wood paneling on the walls. The result will be improved reverberation, bass, and sound differentiation. Additionally, the removal of the excess seating should, representatives say, improve the overall sound quality in the hall. “We have a process, a physical tuning, starting late this summer and fall, Borda says, “where the Philharmonic will come into the hall.” They’ll rehearse, she continues, while technicians literally tweak the walls to improve the sound. “There are actually changes we can make if we’re not comfortable with what it sounds like,” she says.
Beyond the main hall, a former conference room on the northeast side of the building will now be a small performance-community event space called the Sidewalk Studio; the Philharmonic will commission artists to create works to cover the building’s. (In a rendering shown during the building tour, one example appeared to be by the artist Julie Mehretu.) Even the HVAC systems are getting major upgrades.