The design of Bing Concert Hall was imagined from the beginning as a “clearing in the woods” – a place apart, at some remove from the hubbub of the main campus, a place to be discovered, a place to come together.
Richard Olcott, Design Partner
A beacon above the trees, the concert hall drum draws the eye and establishes the building as an arts anchor and destination, visible from multiple vantage points on campus and the surrounding community.
The site design reinforces the balance between the arcadian arboretum and the ordered axiality of the campus grid. The building is conceived as an organic form, with no straight lines, no formal axes, no symmetries, no front and back; however, it retains the distinctive color and materiality of Stanford’s architecture.
Continuous glass walls surrounding the hall blur the distinction between exterior and interior and open the façade to the exterior colonnades, a contemporary expression of a traditional Stanford typology.
It’s a spectacular venue, and we’re very richly rewarded here; it’s such a gift to the community, to the Stanford students, faculty and community. It’s fantastic; we couldn’t be happier.
Lesley Robertson, St. Lawrence String Quartet
The oval-shaped, vineyard-style hall, whose terraced seating sections ring the stage, creates an intimate concert experience for both audience and performer. Large convex-shaped sails circling the hall provide optimal acoustic reflection or absorption and are also designed as screens for video projection.
