National Academy for the Performing Arts (NAPA)
Concert and theatre complex of 2009 whose domed roofs echo the chaconia, the national flower.
The National Academy for the Performing Arts stands on Frederick Street opposite Memorial Park, between the city centre and the Queen's Park Savannah. It was built between 2006 and 2009 by China Jiangsu International for the Urban Development Corporation of Trinidad and Tobago and opened on 9 November 2009. The cluster of curved white shells that forms the roof is intended to suggest the petals of the chaconia, the national flower, and is floodlit at night above a set of musical fountains.
The complex works both as a performance venue and as a teaching institution, with rehearsal studios, a dance room, a piano room and a sound laboratory used by students of the performing arts. The main hall is the Lord Kitchener Auditorium, named after the calypsonian and seating about 1,200, and there is a smaller studio theatre for chamber concerts and drama. Programming ranges from classical concerts and dance seasons to calypso and Carnival events.
Highlights
- Roof of white shells shaped after the chaconia, the national flower
- Lord Kitchener Auditorium, seating about 1,200
- Musical fountains lit at night on the Frederick Street frontage
- Rehearsal studios and teaching rooms for music, dance and drama
