Haworth Tompkins: RIBA Stirling Prize 2014 winners

Public Lecture to celebrate Haworth Tompkins’ Everyman Theatre winning the RIBA Stirling Prize 2014. Organised in collaboration with RCA Architecture

Speakers:

Gemma Bodinetz, Artistic Director at the Everyman will introduce the theatre and talk about the commissioning process.
Steve Tompkins, Director at Haworth Tompkins, will talk about the building and the Studio’s ethos.
Ricky Burdett, Director of LSE Cities will be in conversation with Gemma and Steve following the lecture.
Adam Kaasa, founding member of Theatrum Mundi and Research Fellow in Architecture at the Royal College of Art chaired the evening.

Haworth Tompkins’ Everyman Theatre was the winner of the RIBA Stirling Prize 2014. The building is the studio’s first completely new theatre, and the culmination of both their many explorations into the theatre of the 21st century and a decade-long collaboration with the Liverpool and Merseyside Theatres Trust.

The new Everyman Theatre replaces the nineteenth century home of an iconic Liverpool institution. The building makes use of the constrained topography of the site by arranging the public spaces around a series of half levels, establishing a continuous winding promenade from street to auditorium.

It is an exceptionally sustainable building; not only did the construction re-use 90% of the material from the old theatre, but all spaces are naturally ventilated including the auditorium with its 440 seats. Clever, out of sight concrete labyrinths supply and expel air whilst maintaining total acoustic isolation. It is one of the first naturally ventilated auditoria in the UK.

The Stirling Prize Judges said: ‘The new Everyman in Liverpool is truly for every man, woman and child. It cleverly resolves so many of the issues architects face every day. Its context – the handsome street that links the two cathedrals – is brilliantly complemented by the building’s scale, transparency, materials and quirky sense of humour, notably where the solar shading is transformed into a parade of Liverpudlians.’