During the 20th century, the fate of the riding school building in the south-east tip of the chateau grounds was dubious. As early as in 1910, the Baroque heritage site, built in 1726 by František M. Kaňka, was facing demolition, and was only saved at the last moment thanks to pressure from local heritage-preservation minded citizens. In the early years of the Czechoslovak state, when the chateau complex was taken over by the local authorities in 1921, the question of its demolition arose again. The premises, used as a storehouse for a brewery, had no specific architectural value, and were to be replaced with a new building for educational activities. Land owners, the Thurn-taxis family, put a stop to those plans. After the Second World War, the property was confiscated and used as a pig shed.
In 1964, the riding school was in the care of the district department for heritage care and protection of nature, and decided to use it for cultural purposes. The state department for reconstruction of historical towns and buildings developed a project, lead by architect Josef Habětín, for its adaptation. This project involved significant construction work (e.g. removal of two annexes to make way for a new entrance, unifying all window sizes to match those on the north facade, etc.). The interior, designated for representative exhibitions, was divided into a higher, east section – for the foyer with ticket office and cloakrooms, and a lower section for the main hall, accessible via a trapezoidal staircase. The building gained a new reinforced-concrete ceiling as the loft was to hold the depositary for archives and utility room. The building was handed over in 1974.
After the so-called “Velvet Revolution”, the buildings in the first courtyard were returned to the town council which, in 1995, used the space for exhibiting casts of antique statues from the Museum of Sculpture and Architecture.
Within the framework of a lavish project, Revitalization of the Chateau Hillock, the riding school was converted into a multifunctional, variable hall for holding concerts, conferences, exhibitions and film showings. The singular design for the reconstruction was carried out by HŠH Architects – Jana Šépka, Petr Hájek, and Tomáš Hradečný – between 2007 and 2010.
The architects approached the reconstruction in the same manner as they did when designing their project for the Archdioceses Museum in Olomouc in 1998 – displaying utmost consideration towards the preserved historical construction, whilst simultaneously introducing new designs in materials and forms that would, at first glance, clearly differ from the original elements.
In order to fulfil the requirements of the investor and the multifunctional spirit of the hall and, furthermore, to solve acoustics issues, they designed an inserted, movable, superstructure. This made it possible to change the proportions of the hall and thus, its acoustic properties. It is composed of a corpus with technical and operating areas, and a mobile front-piece – the stage. It slides on rails in the newly installed floor, comprised of mobile platforms, which allows independent lifting of the stage, elevation of the auditorium or individual sectioning of the floor during exhibitions. Adjustable acoustic resonators and lighting technology are hung from the existing concrete ceiling of the hall.
In their choice of materials, the architects remained faithful to three: concrete, steel and translucent, light amber-coloured glass-fibre. The latter covers both the mobile platforms and the uniquely-shaped inserted superstructure, a sort of jewel inside a historical “casket”.
There are two areas where the architects had an impact on the old walls of the riding school – namely, in reinstating the original size of the window chambranles, including the outer bossage of the street facade, and in decreasing the size of the modern entrance to the archive.
However, with their innovative intervention, they managed to raise the tone of the historical building, making its architecture more significant than it was before.
AŠ
