Skip to main content
Add as a preferred source on Google

Seats Highlight of Theatre Renovation

  • 03/01/15
Theatre Seats

Wenger seating brings great comfort and an improved viewing experience to patrons and scholars at the Folger Shakespeare Library and Theatre.

“It was very important to us that our new chairs reflected the room’s inherent aesthetics and acknowledged its history,” explains Beth Emelson, assistant artistic producer with the Folger Shakespeare Library and Folger Theatre in Washington, DC.

Opened in 1932, the Folger is a world-renowned research center on Shakespeare that offers plays, concerts and educational activities for school groups, scholars and tourists alike.

After 20 years of heavy use, the previous seats were starting to fail. The upholstery was tearing; loose springs and nuts rattled noisily. New seats were the centerpieces of general renovations that carefully respected and preserved the Folger’s historic status.

The facility’s design is based on Elizabethan inn yard theatres, with a main seating area flanked by two side galleries and a balcony above. Fixed seats were installed on the main floor, with portable chairs used in the galleries and balcony.

All the Wenger seating is earning rave reviews from Folger staff and audiences alike. “Audiences have reacted very positively to the new chairs — people are really enjoying them,” says Tim Guillot, audience services coordinator.

The side galleries have two rows of chairs; during the planning process the Folger staff tried Portable Audience Chairs of different heights in order to create optimal sight lines over the balcony railings.

For the first row, 32-inch chairs were selected; second-row chairs are two inches higher. “People in the second row don’t realize their chairs are taller, enabling them to see more easily,” says Emelson.

Aesthetically, the Portable Audience Chairs mimic the fixed seats’ wood tone in the arms and seat bottoms, along with the upholstery. Emelson believes the two chair models look like they belong together.

Overall, she praises her terrific experience working with Wenger each step of the way. “Everyone on their team was responsive and understanding of our tight timeline,” Emelson concludes. “We trusted Wenger and they delivered!”

www.wengercorp.com

This article originally appeared in the issue of .

Featured

  • classroom with crystal ball on top of a desk

    Call for Opinions: Spaces4Learning 2026 Predictions for Educational Facilities

    As 2025 winds to a close, the Spaces4Learning staff is asking its readers—school administrators, architects, engineers, facilities managers, builders, superintendents, designers, vendors, and more—to send us their predictions for educational facilities in 2026.

  • El Paso District Breaks Ground on New Elementary School

    The Canutillo Independent School District in El Paso, Texas, recently announced that construction has begun on a 119,000-square-foot elementary school, according to a news release. The district partnered with Pfluger Architects, Carl Daniel Architects, and LDCM Solutions on the new Davenport Elementary School, which has an expected completion date of 2027.

  • Preparing for the Next Era of Healthcare Education, Innovation

    Across the country, public universities and community colleges are accelerating investments in healthcare education facilities as part of a broader strategy to address workforce shortages, modernize outdated infrastructure, and expand clinical training capacity. These projects, which are often located at the center of campus health and science districts, are no longer limited to traditional classrooms.

  • Stanford Completes Construction on Graduate School of Education Facility

    Stanford University in Stanford, Calif., recently announced the end of construction on a new home for its Graduate School of Education, according to a news release. The university partnered with McCarthy Building Companies on the 160,000-square-foot project, which involved two major renovations and one new construction effort.