Gulbenkian Centre, University of Hull

Gulbenkian Centre, University of Hull

Drama teaching centre incorporating a fully adaptable theatre, built 1967-9 by Peter Moro for the University of Hull's Department of Drama. Michael Heard was partner in charge. Clarke Nicholls & Marcel served as structural engineers, and Theatre Projects Limited as lighting and sound consultants. The building employs concrete beam construction with red brick panels restricted to the ground and first floors, board-marked concrete on the upper level, and a copper-clad roof.

The plan forms an elongated octagon. A centrally placed drama studio with a fly tower above forms the highest part of the building, with a smaller studio theatre (converted from a former television studio) positioned to the rear. On the ground floor are audience facilities to the front, radio and sound studios along the west side, and a double-height paint shop along the east side. The first floor houses control rooms for the theatre and studio, academic offices, dressing rooms, and a green room arranged along the sides and front. The second floor contains wardrobe, a rehearsal room, academic offices, a postgraduate room, and a computer room.

The exterior treatment distinguishes the floors clearly. The ground and first floors are of red brick, while the full depth of the second floor is board-marked concrete. Glazing throughout features brown-anodised metal frames with thin mullions. The four diagonal corner stairwells are expressed externally by glazing spanning between handrail height and the ceiling of the first floor, with board-marked concrete below. The stairwell return walls contain ground-floor doorways in the concrete and set back beneath the wider diagonals of the second floor.

The main entrance occupies the short south elevation, centrally placed within a wide double-height recess. Five brick steps and a concrete ramp with brown metal handrails lead to the entrance. A brown-anodised metal frame contains four glazed doors with a deep lintel naming the Gulbenkian Centre in applied mixed-case silver letters, replacing the original capital letters. The frame sits within a glazed screen with thin mullions. Flanking the entrance are two narrow vertical strips of glazing. The concrete second floor displays a row of five elongated octagon windows mirroring the building's footprint.

The long west side elevation features continuous bands of glazing on the ground and first floors alternating with bands of red brick. The second floor has four elongated octagon windows towards the south end. Both ends of the long east side elevation show similar rows of glazing at ground and first-floor levels, with three elongated octagon windows towards the south end of the second floor. The central area of the two lower floors is blind, with a double-height window joining the two rows of glazing to the left and a double-height loading door to the right fitted with a new shutter door. Above the central brick area on the second floor is a wide window lighting the wardrobe room, which projects above the roofline with a glazed roof return. The short north elevation is blank. A green copper-clad roof with a low pitch rises to merge with the tapering central fly tower.

The interior remains largely as built in both layout and appearance, with white-painted brick walls and board-marked concrete in the corner stairwells. The stairwells and some second-floor rooms, including the large rehearsal room, are lit by circular skylights. The triangular corner staircases feature balustrades of wide horizontal timber boards with widely-spaced slender square metal balusters. Many original solid wood doors with simple black-painted timber architraves remain throughout. The most significant alterations are the fitting of the suite of radio and sound studios with soundproof doors and secondary glazing.

The central drama studio is an unadorned square space measuring 57 feet (17.4 metres) with no bias or direction to inhibit flexibility. The floor of the acting area is removable in sections so traps can be made almost anywhere, reached from a basement. Above the acting area at a height of 40 feet (12 metres) is a grid for flying and lighting. Lighting galleries are arranged round the four walls of the square at a height of 17 feet (5 metres). A double-purchase counterweight fly system is operated from the stage-right gallery. The upstage gallery doubles as a paint bridge mechanically raised and lowered, with a paint-frame stretching from stage floor to gallery, allowing backcloths to be painted in-situ. Raked seating on moveable rostra can be arranged round the acting area in various degrees of encirclement, producing either a transverse stage, a thrust stage, or theatre-in-the-round, with seating for around 200. When not needed, the movable seating and rostrums are stored below a fixed rake of 111 seats forming an annex to the square theatre space. This fixed rake is designed for proscenium arch performances where almost the entire square theatre area forms the stage. A stage riser is visually created by opening a shallow band pit, and a flexibly locatable proscenium arch is formed using the flying grid. The limited front-of-house facilities, amounting to a narrow brick-floored foyer and box office, reflect the building's primary purpose as a teaching facility for drama rather than as an entertainment venue for paying audiences. The studio theatre has been converted from a television studio with the installation of seating rakes on the north and south sides. Two overhead catwalks across the studio have been removed.