Marlboro Music Reich Hall | Marlboro - Vermont |2022

Architects: HGA
Lead Architect: Joan Soranno
Senior Project Architects: John Cook and Beth Kali
Design Team: David Wilson, James Kehl, Dan Avchen, Ariane Laxo, and Natalie Rethlake
General Contractor: Courtland Construction Corporation
Client: Marlboro Music
Photographers: Albert Vecerka/Esto

Since 1951, generations of the world’s most talented classical musicians have come together to participate in Marlboro Music, a non-profit, seven-week summer festival where young musicians collaborate alongside renowned artists in an environment removed from the pressures of performance. Each season, the music festival takes over the tiny campus of Marlboro College in the foothills of Vermont’s Green Mountains. Marlboro Music encompasses not only music but a communal way of life where musicians, staff, their spouses, and children share meals, seminars, chores, and social events. The New Yorker magazine calls Marlboro Music the classical world’s most coveted retreat and participants have included such celebrated musicians as cellists Yo-Yo Ma and Pablo Casals, pianist Mitsuko Uchida, and violinist Joshua Bell. Over the course of seven decades, the campus’s aging farm buildings became less-than-ideal environments for music rehearsal and housing Marlboro’s world-renowned chamber music archive.

Driven by a desire to best serve the needs of 21st-century musicians and the music itself, the design of the new Celia Bertin Reich Rehearsal Building & Music Library (Reich Hall) stays true to the spirit of Marlboro and the simple, country ethos of Southern Vermont, while providing much-needed modern rehearsal spaces, a music library, staff offices, and common areas.

The design for Reich Hall was inspired by a Cape Cod cottage 400-year-old typology derived from 17th-century English settler’s dwellings in New England and the primary inspiration for Marlboro College’s centuries-old buildings. Born of necessity with an aesthetic of restraint, this simple gabled form is closely tied to Marlboro’s identity and served as the project’s design template. The building’s small footprint, sloped roofs, compact volumes, and local materials reinforce Marlboro Music’s place within the lush rolling hills and streams of the Green Mountains.

Fully integrating Reich Hall into the steeply sloped terrain with as little site disturbance as possible was a primary design goal. The four pitched-roof forms step down with the natural slope of the landscape, with the upper and lower levels organized around south-facing outdoor rooms that provide space for community gatherings. Among its sustainable features, Reich Hall has large operable windows and abundant natural light; energy efficient, geothermal heating and cooling systems; and a green roof that can be enjoyed as an outdoor terrace.

Acoustically, Reich Hall is a premier space in which to play music. Within the wood-clad rehearsal rooms, a portion of the walls tilts inward to prevent flutter echoes. A pattern of reflective and absorptive elements of wood panels and glass maintains a sense of simplicity while optimizing mountain views and allowing natural light to fill the space.

Marlboro is also home to one of the world’s largest collections of chamber music and requires a library to help archive and preserve these works, as well as provide a room for study and browsing. The new music library includes archive storage; seminar seating for researchers, musicians, and students; and flexible work areas for two librarians. Climate control, fire protection, lighting, and security were all critical when designing this space.