Recent acoustic designs in China, challenges, and design approach

Abstract

Marshall Day Acoustics has now completed and commissioned sixteen performing arts venues in China and has another sixteen in design or in construction. It seems an opportune time to reflect on the latest challenges, technically or otherwise and how we have successfully approached them. Projects have become bigger and more complex, yet clients’ expectations and requirement for certainty in the outcome have increased. The paper will include three recent examples. The 1,500-seat concert hall and 1,000-seat drama theatre of the Jiangsu Grand Theatre both required on-site design to ensure acoustic requirements were met, in time. The 2,000-seat Qingdao Grand Theatre achieved a very low reverberation time suitable for the use of multiple complex sound systems while maintaining the hard finish look desired by the client. This required both careful predictions and laboratory testing. Finally, the 2,040-seat opera house at Shaanxi Grand Theatre that was delivered in less than three years. Atypical materials and simple design principles were implemented to meet the project timeframe. These cases are examples of successful acoustic engineering and what can be achieved when applying first principles and sound science, backed by simulations, testing and experience.