Volkstheater Renovation, Vienna (AT)

In summer 2016, we were awarded the contract for the general renovation of the Vienna Volkstheater in a joint bid with FCP Fritsch, Chiari & Partner and Alexander van der Donk. Built in 1889 in neo-Renaissance style, the theatre offers 850 seats and the famous Red Salon.
The aim of the urgently needed renovation and conversion was to offer the audience contemporary comfort, to establish modern safety standards and to improve economic efficiency. The entire listed building stock and thus the original character were preserved.

Client: Volkstheater GmbH
Location: A-1070 Vienna, Neustiftgasse 1
Architecture: Dietrich | Untertrifaller with Van der Donk
Project management: Michael Porath, Axel Laimer-Liedtke
Competition: 2016
Construction: 2019-2020
Area: ca. 600 m² (Total floor area 8.585 m²)

Planning
project control, structural engineering, building physics: FCP Fritsch, Chiari & Partner / building services: Zentraplan, Wiener Neustadt / electrics: TB Eipeldauer+Partner, Traiskirchen / stage: Kottke, Bayreuth / acoustics: Müller BBM, Planegg / landscape: Kieran Fraser, Vienna

Execution
builder: Böhm Stadtbaumeister & Gebäudetechnik, Vienna / roof: Fritz Lechner, Vienna / HAVCR: Georg Wieselthaler, Schwechat / electrics & building services: Emmerich Csernohorszky, Vienna / façade renovation: Rudolf Denk, Vienna / stage machinery: Waagner-Biro Austria Stage Systems, Vienna

photos: © EMILBLAU / Martin Geyer, © Dietrich | Untertrifaller

Publications
2022 | 03 Wettbewerbe Aktuell Volkstheater Wien | 03 Bauen + Wirtschaft DC3, B.R.I.O., Volkstheater, Kuku 23 Wien | 02 VN Volkstheater Wien

L0
L1

Stage wing

In order to optimise internal processes, we have reorganised and partially converted the rooms in the stage wing. A small extension with a lifting platform now ensures level delivery to the stage. Together with the new side stage and the large marshalling area in front of it, this new structuring enables a smooth process for delivery, set-up and changeover. The artists’ dressing rooms are located in the north-western part of the building and have their own access.

Spectator area

The rooms in the visitors’ section were also reorganised. The Red Salon can now be used independently of the main building. The new café on the ground floor with its information point and garden in front of it forms an inviting extended foyer. We have combined the previously decentralised public cloakrooms on the ground floor into a central cloakroom whose new, clear design interacts confidently yet sensitively with the historic building.

The Red Salon
Foyer
Central cloakroom ground floor
Cloakroom first floor

The great hall shines again

Lighting & Facade

We paid special attention to the renewal of the lighting. The wall candelabra on the columns under the balcony and tier, the light in the boxes and the central illumination of the theatre hall were restored and supplemented according to historical plans. The façade lighting makes the new old splendour of the house visible on the outside as well. To improve the thermal quality, the theatre’s richly structured plaster façade was cleaned and renovated in agreement with the Federal Office for the Protection of Monuments. The partially leaking flat roofs, roof terraces and domes were also repaired and re-roofed.
Even if you can no longer see much of the work that has been done, you can feel it everywhere in the building and it will give pleasure to staff and visitors for a long time to come.

Some impressions of our construction site