From Crosscut: “Seattle Opera wig master Ashlee Naegle begins the process of creating a custom wig for performer Martin Muehle inside the new Opera Center at Seattle Center. With the new building comes the opera’s first dedicated wig shop. (All photos by Matt M. McKnight/Crosscut)
Seattle Opera opens a soaring new headquarters this weekend, its translucent façade lit in dreamy purple for the occasion. Designed by NBBJ architects and located next door to McCaw Hall (the opera’s performance venue at Seattle Center), the $60 million, 105,000-square-foot “Opera Center” features tall banks of windows, a Mercer Street-facing event space for community programming and staff lounges with killer views of the Space Needle. The new accommodations offer 20,000 more square feet than the previous HQ, and house three rehearsal studios, classrooms, a lofty costume shop and, for the first time, dedicated space for wig making.
The old building — a former carpet factory in South Lake Union that Seattle Opera had leased for staff, rehearsal space and storage since 1993 — was notoriously dark, cramped and labyrinthine. The hair and makeup department was lodged in a storage space at the end of a hallway. It had no door, just a plain curtain separating the windowless space from the freight elevator.