Takero Shimazaki Architects rebuilds The Yard Theatre in Hackney Wick, London

The Yard Theatre began in 2011 in a converted Hackney Wick warehouse, designed by Practice Architecture to last just three months. Local studio Takero Shimazaki Architects has now turned that makeshift venue into a permanent one, extending into neighbouring studios and a brick-walled former brewery and reusing as much as it could. Shimazaki told Dezeen the brief was about the theatre "growing up", and that the form plays on a church built from light industrial materials.

The brewery now holds a new 224-capacity theatre with curved amphitheatre seating under a pitched frame of laminated veneer lumber on reclaimed tubular steel. The original 110-seat space has been overhauled, and the old theatre building has become a bar and public foyer under a new roof, with lifts and stairs climbing to the upper seating. Backstage sits tucked beneath the tiered seats.

Outside, the thing you'll spot first is an old crane tower reworked as a 23-metre ventilation chimney, clad in translucent polycarbonate so it reads as a beacon. Stacked boxes in fibre-cement, polycarbonate and colourful K-Briq, made from more than 95 per cent recycled material, sit above the warehouse, and an Antony Gormley figure stands on the roof. Bricks from the demolition went back into the stage wall.

A good reason to head east for a show; check the programme before you go.

Our summary of a story from Dezeen, published 21 October 2026. Read the original