Drama or musical ensembles also need the right physical and emotional space to develop, try-out, rehearse and perform their material. In the southern Dutch village of Herpt, Mecanoo have crafted such a place from an old barn, a non profit initiative of Hans Andersson, Francine Houben’s husband. It opened in 2020 as De Nieuwe Schuur, which means ‘the new barn’. With its big pitched roof, the building’s simple shape refers to the original barn, but its ground floor now houses a theatre hall and kitchen.
Groups can sleep on several floors with windows looking out across the surrounding orchard, the idyllic flat farmland, rivers and trees of the Brabant countryside. All floors are completely lined with wood, which makes it feel warm and cosy. De Nieuwe Schuur is also the perfect inspiring environment for management teams as a retreat to brainstorm and plan, away from the corporate environment.
Above ground, De Nieuwe Schuur is a cross-laminated timber structure with wood cladding. With this traditional technique, originated by the Japanese in the 18th century, the wood is burned until the surface is charred, and then coated with natural oil. The char acts as an insulator and slows the rate of burning. Colours appear on the long ground floor facades under the roof eaves, which are clad with glazed tiles in eight shades of grey, green and blue, made by Netherlands oldest ceramics company (1572), Royal Tichelaar.
In the furniture we recognise the Mecanoo blue fabric of the chairs of the Playhouse, one of the halls in the National Kaohsiung Centre for the Arts. The large concrete basement houses not only sustainable mechanical equipment and storage space – what is so needed for a theatre – it also houses a jazz cellar. In one room down there, a Mecanoo Blue carpet is literally rolled out and up the wall for Houben’s personal project The Blue Wall, which captures all visitors with a photograph.