After years of waiting, the people of Torun, Poland finally have a high-quality cultural venue in their city, which is a UNESCO world heritage site.

First announced in 2008, work has finally been completed on the CKK Jordanki concert hall – designed by Spanish architects Fernando Menis Arquitectos – and the venue is hosting its first shows following a high-profile inauguration ceremony broadcast live on television.

The building – located in a riverside park between Torun’s medieval old town and the city’s new urban area – has been designed as a flexible performance space that can host theatrical shows, operas, symphonies, films and musicals. A concrete element can descend from the top of the auditorium when needed, to reduce the volume of the space and change the acoustics of the room, suiting a variety of different performance types.

The interior of the auditorium, evocative of a large cavern, is constructed with the reddish brick used prominently in the city’s historical buildings. The exteriors use the same brick alongside white concrete in what the architects describe as “a game of colours”.

“The colour scheme emphasises the dichotomy between the site's legacy, suggested by the use of brick, and the technology and modernity of new urban developments,” said the studio.

“The project had to be developed with sensitivity to emphasise the surrounding historic values, while articulating that it is a new development."

Gaps built into the structure’s exterior are designed to look like tears in the facade and open up the performance space to the surrounding public realm to attract passers-by inside. The option of opening up the interior hall to the outside has also been added, allowing visitors to pass through into the public square.

The budget for the project was €51m, (US$55.3m, £37.9m), funded by the Municipality of Torun.