Future Opera – Main Venue

Opernhaus Zürich AG, together with the Building Department and the Department of Culture of the Canton of Zurich, is planning the renovation and extension of the Zurich Opera House. The selective competition “Future Opera – Main Venue” will be launched in November and covers both the existing Opera House and the extension building, which also houses the Bernhard Theater. The infrastructure of the cultural institution is to be made fit for the future, requiring existing space constraints and operational deficiencies to be addressed. In addition, the building is to be made more accessible and attractive to the wider public.

The procedure will be conducted as a selective, single-stage and anonymous project competition based on SIA Regulation 142/2025. A maximum of 25 teams will be selected for the competition following prequalification in the disciplines of architecture, construction management, structural engineering and landscape architecture. The admitted teams are free to strengthen their competition teams by engaging additional specialist consultants of their choice, for example in the fields of theatre and operational planning, sustainability, energy and HVACSE engineering, fire protection, building physics, etc.

The competition will be published on simap.ch and Konkurado in November 2026.

Schedule

Submission of applications (Phase 1) – January 2027

Start of project competition (Phase 2) – March 2027

Submission of projects (Phase 2) – June 2027