The French architect Jean Marie Charpentier was commissioned to design a new cultural center for China’s financial capital, in the center of Shanghai. The Shanghai Grand Theater stretches its huge roof to the blue sky, symbolizing a Chinese national treasure bowl holding the universe’s kindness and wisdom. The building facilitates Shanghai’s enthusiastic pursuit of the world culture and arts as well as its flexibility ever since ancient times.

Located at the People’s Square, the Shanghai Grand Theater occupies an area of 2.1 hectares, facing the People’s Boulevard in the south, along Huangpi Beilu in the west, next to the Shanghai Municipal Building in the East. The new style architecture combines the Eastern and Western flavor. While naturally choosing to represent Chinese tradition, Jean Marie Charpentier also wished to make a dynamic architectural statement with his surrounding complex, at the historical center of the city.

The roof is constructed as an upturned segment of a circle, symbolizing The Sky. Thus, with the surrounding glass facades and pillared entrance hall, a symbolically rich structure is created to contain mostly Western art, and this duality plays a central role in the architecture. The structure accommodates two stages, an auditorium and a foyer, as well as shops and other public spaces, and is based on a square, which in Chinese tradition represents The Earth.

The Shanghai Grand Theater occupies 11,528 m2 of land and commands a total floor area of 62,803 m2. There are three theaters in Shanghai Grand Theatre: an 1800-seat main theater for ballet, a 550-seat medium theater for Chinese opera and chamber music, and a 250-seat small one for drama. The layout of the other areas allows the building to be hosted for the different types of performance, mainly opera, ballet and symphony events.

The internal structure has been designed to provide maximum comfort to audiences before and during performances, and the stunning facades create a spectacular image to the outside world, especially at night. Since its opening on August 27, 1998 the Shanghai Grand Theater has successfully staged such shows and evenings as operas, musicals, ballets, symphonies, chamber music concerts, spoken drama and the Chinese operas. The theater has become an important window of cultural exchange between China and the world and a bridge of artistic communication.

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