Buildings become "dance partners" at Snøhetta's Dartmouth arts centre extension
International architecture studio Snøhetta has completed an expansion to the Hopkins Center for the Arts at Dartmouth College, fitting two new cubic volumes onto an existing 1960s building.
Located on the Dartmouth College campus in New Hampshire, the Hopkins Center for the Arts (The Hop) is a sprawling complex that serves as the school's arts and cultural hub, containing a multi-level network of theatres, auditoriums and studios.
Snøhetta released designs for the centre's expansion in 2022, adding to the original design by architect Wallace K Harrison. The expansion included filling in open spaces in the programme, such as a former outdoor courtyard, and creating new outward-facing volumes to hold performances.
The two main volumes added are the Recital Hall building at the front, which is clad in bronze-coloured steel panels and the Daryl Roth Studio Theatre on the backside, which is wrapped in precast concrete with a skirting made of the same steel material as the Recital Hall.
The project also encompassed revitalising existing spaces in the centre, such as the 900-seat Spaulding Auditorium.
The studio also updated the Top of the Hop, a social and gathering space.
Snøhetta looked to the existing building to inform the design of the Recital Hall, designing it to be "like a lantern" for the campus, when light passes through the arched mullion windows at night.
Because the massing of the new structure protrudes in a similar way to the rounded-arch facade of Harrison's design, the studio referenced dance partners when talking about the effect of the Recital Hall's presence.
"[The buildings] just feel like they belong together," said Snøhetta co-founder Craig Dykers.
"They're dance partners. They're not doing the same thing, otherwise, they'd step on each other's feet, but they're dancing in a group together. And they both feel that they represent the arts."
The buildings are connected via an irregularly shaped volume that wraps around the Roth Wing's volume and attaches it to the main building via a glass-enclosed space.
Dubbed the Forum, the space serves as a lobby and connects the two levels of the Roth Wing to the existing building via an open, curved staircase covered in striated wood.
The stair also leads to the second-storey Recital Hall, which looks out through the building's window mullions.
The campus's first dance studio is located directly below the Recital Hall and is slightly subterranean, exposed by windows that run along its perimeter at ground level.
Other new spaces include the Mindy Kaling Theatre Lab, which is located on the lower level.
Additional updates include the formalisation of the plaza in front of The Hop, which "offers a new central and sunlit point of entry".
The arts centre sits across from the Hood Museum of Art on the campus, which was also recently overhauled by Tod Williams Billie Tsien.
Other recent Snøhetta projects include a sculptural addition to the home of St Louis Symphony Orchestra in St Louis, while Dezeen rounded up five of the studio's buildings that can be walked on.
The photography is by Alexa Bendek unless otherwise noted
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