In Tuesday’s (8/21) Charleston City Paper (South Carolina), Susan Cohen writes, “It’s noisy on the stretch of Calhoun Street between Meeting and East Bay. … But the biggest bang on Tuesday morning had to come from Charleston Mayor Joseph P. Riley Jr., wearing a neon yellow vest and manning a track hoe, as he toppled a corner of the canopy cover of the Gaillard Auditorium’s George Street driveway. The sound marked the creation of a new Gaillard Center, the $142 million project that’s met its share of controversy. What is now a construction site is wrapped up in a blue ribbon banner like a present that won’t be opened until 2015. … The current theater, with its over 2,600 seats, is an unwieldy size for providing quality acoustics. Its layout—with a single orchestra level and a single large balcony—does little to provide every theatergoer with the same experience.” The new hall “will be more like an opera house than a theater, with the space being narrowed to 1,800 seats and acoustic considerations taken into account. … With the reduced size of the auditorium, along with technical upgrades, the building should be more suitable for more different types of events.”
Posted August 23, 2012
