The opera house was built for Margrave Frederick of Brandenburg-Bayreuth and his wife, Princess Wilhelmine of Prussia, and inaugurated for the marriage of their daughter. The infobox gives 1744 to 1748, while the lead gives 1745 to 1750. Joseph Saint-Pierre designed the plans, and Giuseppe Galli Bibiena and his son Carlo designed the wooden interior in a Late Baroque Italian style.
The sandstone facade has large Corinthian columns referencing Place Vendôme in Paris, topped by a balustrade with statues of Minerva, Apollo and six Muses. The building is about 235 feet (71.5 m) long, 102 feet (31 m) wide and 85 feet (26 m) tall. Its bell-shaped auditorium has gold accents and a trompe l'oeil ceiling and seats roughly 500.
The court loge is largely original, and only the curtain was lost, taken by Napoleon's troops in 1812. UNESCO listed it in 2012. It closed that October and reopened on April 12, 2018.
Comments