
Victoria Eugenia Theatre
LOCATION:
San Sebastián (SPAIN)
ARCHITECT:
Francisco de Urcola (original) Joaquín Zubiría & Gerhard Loch (reforma)
MODEL:
VICTORIA EUGENIA
MORE INFO:
- CLIENT: victoriaeugenia.com
- FABRIC: www.velours-blafo.com
- ARCHITECTS: www.arquitectoszubiria.com
- Building picture by José Miguel Llano
When the city of San Sebastian opted for becoming a “spa city” and queen Maria Cristina decided to spend her vacations there, all the members of the Spanish royal family passed their Summer holidays there until 1928. Subsequently the city turned into the Summer court of the Spanish Crown because not only kings & queens spent their days in San Sebastian but also ministers, politicians and ambassadors. Lots of small cultural and leisure places appeared in the city but it was in 1912 when the Victoria Eugenia theatre was inaugurated. This building designed by Francisco de Urcola became rapidly one of the most impressive theaters in Spain: the architect applied many of his international experiences & technologies seen in theatrical venues in Paris and Vienna. Since then it has been the venue selected for operetta openings as well as all the editions of the San Sebastian Film Festival until 1999 – world premieres like Hitchcock’s Vertigo and North by Northwest took place at this theatre. After a long and hard refurbishing process started in 2001 the new reformed building opened his doors on 1st March 2007 with major modifications like the two new spaces created. A wide hall totally restricted to dancing rehearsals and one innovative venue named “Club Hall” dedicated to chamber music, jazz and conferences. And of course other technological advances were finally implemented like a new improved scenic area and the latest audiovisual technologies.
Among the key necessities of the refurbished theatre the customer expressed his wish of replacing all the existing seats with new wider and comfortable chairs. And of course the new chairs should keep the style of the original theatre – this was probably the most demanding issue. So Ascender developed a custom design chair supervised by Mr Joaquin Zubiria: the resulting outer structure of the Victoria Eugenia model was produced in cast aluminum with sand moulds. This special structure starts from the backrest, goes down to the arm where it acts as main support and finishes in the peculiar 90º fixing plate designed to allow fixing points both to the floor and riser. Meanwhile the back is made of metal with the same of a tile: this enables the back of the spectator to be totally embraced by the cushion while adding on extra “classic item” (note the space created for the recessed seat numbering brass plate). The result is a premium chair manufactured in aluminum and full of modernist flavor: check the curves of the standard coming down from the arm to the hinge of the seat where the row numbering is located! And to complete the vintage look we used a superb 600 gr French velour of 100% Trevira CS thread by Blafo Velours.