USC's New Home for Dance

	Glorya Kaufman International Dance Center at USC. Photo: Ema Peter

Los Angeles now has a palace for dance and dance education with the opening of the Glorya Kaufman International Dance Center, home of the Glorya Kaufman School of Dance at the University of Southern California. In conjunction with Pfeiffer Partners Architects, Inc., Auerbach Pollock Friedlander provided theatre consulting services from the earliest stages of planning and design to the completion of construction for the performance studio and five other dance studios. McKay Conant Hoover, Inc. was the acoustician for the project. Seeded by a generous donation from the facility's namesake, the state-of-the-art building was designed in close collaboration with Kaufman, dean Robert Cutietta, and vice dean and director Jodie Gates. The coordination of performance technical requirements was done by working closely with associate dean of operations Jeffrey de Caen. The use of natural light and open space within the building feels inspired by dance itself.

"The flowing interior design celebrates movement and the expanse provides one with a sense of lift, just as Glorya Kaufman intended," said de Caen.

Auerbach Pollock Friedlander designed systems that are flexible and easily operated. The performance studio, the building's largest dance space, is quickly converted from an open studio to a theatre space for 140 patrons with the aid of a motorized retractable seating system, tracking blackout draperies, and an overhead pipe grid. The grid holds a complete LED lighting inventory and control.

The five additional dance studios range in size from 2,300- to 2,500-sq.-ft. with 25' ceilings that offer ample space for rehearsals, lectures, informal performances, and dance classes. A training and fitness zone, collaborative workspace, dressing rooms, classrooms, and offices round out the new building. Specific details enhance all six studios including resiliently-mounted floating sprung floor systems by Harlequin that isolate sound and the impact of movement.

The modern building has a motto of "The New Movement" which is defined by the school as "the development of new movement models for dance, where intersecting dance techniques create hybrid forms to be expressed in new media, scholarship, studio practice, and choreography."