Witherford Watson Mann has overhauled a former stable block in Leicestershire to create the rural Nevill Holt Opera theatre, which is shortlisted for this year's Stirling Prize.
Located on a listed estate in the English hamlet Nevill Holt, the building seeks to echo the "imaginative space of opera" by challenging the typical aesthetic of a theatre.
Witherford Watson Mann's theatre is built directly within the former stable yard, which is surrounded by stables on all four sides. These buildings have been retained and filled with rough, textured interior finishes in a nod to the former use.

"The challenge of this project for us was that few of the conventional configurations of a theatre were possible ? but this was also precisely its charm," explained the architecture studio. "Every addition or adjustment had to be judged on its merits, to work in relation to the ironstone walls, and the doors and windows that pepper them: bending to these constraints gave direction to the many fine judgements that make up a theatre."

Given the tight constraints of the existing structure, Witherford Watson Mann doubled the size of the stable block by adding by a new steel and wooden roof and cutting into the ground to create the stalls and orchestra pit.
This created space for the insertion of a traditional operatic horseshoe-shaped balcony above the theatre's stalls.

Raised on slender cross-shaped steel columns, the balcony's curvature is designed to help wi...