As a result of the reconstruction, the Palace of Music and Congresses in Strasbourg has significantly expanded and acquired a holistic look, corresponding to its increased importance. In 2011, a consortium of two experienced bureaus - Austrian Dietrich | Untertrifaller and French Rey-Lucquet & Associés - won the competition for a project to renovate the Palace in the context of transforming the Wacken-Europe area into an international business center (next to the exhibition complex and a number of EU administrative institutions, including the European Parliament building).
The complex of two concert and conference halls, which were successively erected in the 1970s and 80s, had a utilitarian look and no longer corresponded to the increased demand for capacity and functional flexibility. The architects proposed to expand the congress center, creating a symbiosis of the old and the new and turning the building into the dominant feature of the area through a new - integral - visual image. Construction took place in 2012–2016, and the House of Music and Congresses did not stop working.
The composition is based on the geometric motif of equilateral triangles, in accordance with which the Palace developed from the very beginning. This construction has been applied to everything from the shape of the building to the details of interior decoration. The new wing added to the west of the two old ones, like them, has a hexagonal shape. It houses the Rhine multifunctional hall with an area of 3000 sq. m, and at the junction with the original volume, a new entrance group was formed - the central vestibule, which unites concert, conference rooms and exhibition spaces into a single whole. Thanks to this, the readability of the interior space has improved. The ceiling of the lobby is cut with triangular openings, and the entrance area is arranged outside.
To give the complex a visual unity, it was surrounded by an open gallery with a colonnade of almost a kilometer in length. It consists of pillars sheathed in stainless steel with non-repetitive, broken shapes; each support - weighing 6 tons and 15 meters high. The new part of the building is separated from the gallery by a completely transparent wall. The single façade creates a lively rhythm and emphasizes the horizontal position of the Palace, forming its monumental appearance. Also in this gesture is seen the desire of the authors to complete the asymmetrical silhouette and put an end to the expansion of the building.
The old halls underwent reconstruction: the main one ("Erasmus"), with 1900 seats, was optimized for concerts and conferences, and the capacity of the second ("Schweizer") increased to 1200 seats. There are also new ones: a blue concert hall for 520 seats ("Cassin") and a conference hall in red tones ("Marie Curie"): designed for 450 seats, but with the possibility of splitting in two, it is "suspended" above the lobby, from which views to the interior and the surrounding park. There was also room for a rehearsal hall decorated with oak for the Strasbourg Philharmonic Orchestra. The building also houses meeting rooms, bars, a restaurant, offices and a parking lot. As a result of the reconstruction, the area of the complex has increased almost one and a half times - up to 45,000 square meters. m. The object was awarded a nomination for the EU architectural award - the Mies van der Rohe Prize-2017.
