New home for Rambert on London’s South Bank

Rambert has moved into the first major purpose-built dance facility to open in London for 10 years. Its new home includes dance studios, treatment and body conditioning rooms, workshops, offices and an archive which includes over 650 hours of newly digitised footage. The new building is located on a site owned by social enterprise Coin Street Community Builders, which has been made available in return for a commitment to provide a significant community dance programme in the local area, and a peppercorn rent of one pair of ballet shoes a year. Coin Street Community Builders’ Group Director Iain Tuckett said: “For me the project has always had two key objectives: to secure for Rambert’s brilliant dancers facilities of a standard that their dedication deserves; and to offer our South Bank and Bankside community the opportunity to engage in one of life’s supreme art forms.” Rambert raised £12.6m from private sources and was granted £7m of public funding from the National Lottery through Arts Council England for the project. Chief Executive Nadia Stern said: “Creating a new home for Rambert has been a huge collaborative effort from everyone involved, and it is testament to 12 years of dedicated work that we are now able to take up residency in this wonderful building.”

Plans for 2014 include the creation of site-specific works for the building and increasing the number of young people and adults taking part in Rambert’s open access dance classes and workshops by 40%. The building’s three main studios have been named the Marie Rambert Studio, after the company’s founder; the Mercury Studio, acknowledging the Mercury Theatre, the company’s first home; and the Anya Linden Studio, in recognition of the generous contribution to the fundraising campaign from two of the Sainsbury Family Charitable Trusts. Rambert’s Artistic Director, Mark Baldwin, said: “Every aspect of this building has been designed with the express purpose of laying bare the process of contemporary dance, allowing us to create an open house that will excite and inspire audiences. The time has come for dance to take its place on the South Bank among other prestigious arts organisations, and it seems fitting to me that Rambert, with its unique combination of heritage and pioneering vision, is the company to bring it here.”