Ranging from orientation week events like True Blue to Sage the Gemini performing at the Heatwave concert, all Duke students have at one point been inside Page Auditorium. This year's first-years, however, are a different story.
By the time Duke’s students arrived on campus for the Fall 2018 semester, Page Auditorium—located next to the Duke Chapel—was undergoing renovations. This is the second time that Page has been renovated in the past five years, with the first round of work taking place in 2014 and 2015, but everything included in the original project couldn’t be done in the first stage of changes and construction.
“For the second phase, it was Duke’s choice to go back and install a sprinkler system which will be completed in Spring 2019,” wrote Sharon Hamilton, director of facilities management, in an email.
She wrote that due to the timing and infrastructure required, Page was completed with a two-phase approach, with the first of them occurring in 2015.
The first renovation included new carpeting, painting the walls and ceiling, adding a handicap-accessible lift, refurbishing seating at the orchestra level and reconstructing a control room.
As a result of the changes, seating was reduced from 1,238 to 1,100 seats. Additionally, the auditorium got a fire sprinkler system, a new hot water heating system, new house lighting, updated stage lighting mounts and new exterior roofing.
Currently, the first event scheduled on Duke Calendar to take place in the new Page Auditorium will be a performance by renounced flamenco dancer Farruquito on Feb. 19, 2019.
Until then, events that might typically take place in Page are relocated to other spaces on campus such as the Reynolds Industries Theater and Griffith Film Theater in the Bryan Center.
O-Show, the collaborative a cappella performance on the first day of classes, took place in the Reynolds Theater, and Heatwave was performed on Abele Quad as intended. True Blue was divided between Reynolds and Griffith Theaters to accommodate the number of first-years attending each session.
Get The Chronicle straight to your inbox
Signup for our weekly newsletter. Cancel at any time.