Basel's ‘Kuppel’, the city’s leading concert hall, located in the Nachtigallenwäldeli park in the south of the city, was initially housed in a temporary dome tent since 1988, until its demolition 2016 to make way for a permanent building. Vécsey Schmidt Architek:innen, based in Basel and winners of the 2019 competition, proposed an orthogonal building crowned with barrel vaults, blending into the park like a garden pavilion while continuing, at night, to set the Basel pop music scene alight.

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‘Just as the pop music scene oscillates between underground and popular, between subversive and mainstream,’ explain the architects.

‘The different profiles and arches – the concave, blended barrel vaults of the dome, the gallery with its convex, timber-clad parapets – are designed to diffuse sound in a variety of ways’

 

 

 

 

‘During the construction phase a decision was taken by the clients to add a second building. The so-called Volume 3 is an elongated structure along the Binningerstrasse that not only shields the Kuppel from traffic noises, but also provides additional functions serving the dome: concert and event offices, restaurants, parts of the facility services and the obligatory solar panels installed on the pitched roof have all been relocated to this building.’ The Volume 3 building is connected to the Kuppel with a common basement.

‘The construction is based on the house-in-house principle that ensures sound insulation from the inside to the outside. The inner roof is made up of a concrete vault with in-situ concrete ribs and in-situ concrete arches. The outer roof consists of a prefabricated wooden vault with insulation and the mass necessary for sound insulation. This means that it is acoustically separated from the shell. The inner facade was designed as an in-situ concrete wall. The outer facade is a steel structure, decoupled from the shell, and lined with exposed brickwork.’

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Kuppel Basel, Basel, Switzerland

Programme: Construction of a pop concert venue and a nightclub with band practice spaces, catering, offices and associated businesses.
Client: Stiftung Kuppel (main financing), Canton Basel-Stadt (financial contribution to band practice spaces
Architects: Vécsey Schmidt Architekt:innen
Surface: 2,409 sq.m
Completion: 2024
Cost: 12.8 million euros

In 2023, AA’s December issue was dedicated to ‘Celebration’, available from our online shop.