The Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts was established in Miami as Florida's premier performing arts center; it is also the second largest of its kind in the United States, after New York's Lincoln Center. It serves as the "home stage" for troupes of the Miami City Ballet and the Florida Bolshoi Opera House, as well as a stage for touring orchestras and theater troupes. Initially, the new performing arts center had a different name - "Carnival Center", but a year and a half later, when the patron Adrienne Arsht decided to take it under her wing and allocated $ 30 million for its development, the complex was renamed in her honor.
The center is built on the site of the Sears Art Deco department store. The only surviving part of it - the Carnival tower of 1927 - was included in the project of the Arts Square, created simultaneously with the center.
The architect of the new theater complex is Cesar Pelli (Pelli Clarke Pelli Architects). The work was carried out in conjunction with the theater design consultancy Fisher Dachs Associates Inc. and the acoustics company ARTEC Inc.
The 53,000 m2 Adrienne Arsht Center consists of two buildings: the Sanford and Dolores Ziff Ballet and Opera Theater and the John S. and James L. Knight Concert Hall. These structures are united by the Parker and Bath Thomson Arts Square, through which one of the main streets of Miami - Biscayne Boulevard runs. The buildings are stepped volumes, faced with light beige Sardinian granite; their facades with entrance groups are fully glazed.
Knights Concert Hall
At the Knights Concert Hall, seating 2,200, the acoustic solution is applicable not only to symphony, recitals and chamber music, but also to pop and jazz. To accommodate such a wide variety of styles, the auditorium is equipped with a three-piece, adjustable canopy chandelier suspended over the stage speaker system, each of which can be raised or lowered to alter the sound reflection characteristics.
Another acoustic feature of the Knights Hall is the adjacent acoustic control room, where large concrete doors lead: depending on whether they are open or closed, the character of the sound and the time of its reverberation (the process of a gradual decrease in the intensity of sound with its multiple reflections) changes.
Ziff Ballet and Opera Theater
In the traditional horseshoe-shaped auditorium of the Ziff Ballet and Opera Theater, a 12-meter round acoustic panel, covered with rounded and spiral protrusions, hangs from the ceiling. This hall is the main stage of the building and is designed for 2480 spectators. But, in addition to it, there is also a studio theater for 300 seats "Carnival Studio Theater" with a "black box" hall for small drama and ballet performances.
The Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts in Miami was erected using 30,200 m2 of CertaPro ™ AcoustaBoard ™ Black (Saint-Gobain), designed specifically for theaters, studios and other entertainment venues. Providing excellent sound absorption, it controls room reverberation and sound reflection, and also reduces noise. To improve the quality of sound and heat insulation in the external and internal walls, 10,400 m2 of CertaPro R19 (Saint-Gobain) and 4,200 m2 of CertaPro R11 (Saint-Gobain) were also used.
Saint-Gobain is an international industrial group of companies headquartered in Paris. The history of this company goes back over 300 years. It is included in the TOP-100 of the largest industrial corporations in the world and ranks first among the world's largest companies producing building materials, according to Forbes magazine.
The Saint-Gobain group of companies includes several lines of business. There are 4 represented in Russia: ISOVER (insulating materials), Gyproc (plasterboard and gypsum mixes), Weber-Vetonit (dry building mixes) and ECOPHON (acoustic materials).
