About the Royal Opera House
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There's been a theatre on this site since 1732, when the first Theatre Royal opened; Handel wrote operas and oratorios for it. Fire destroyed it in 1808, and its replacement in 1856. The present building, designed by Edward Middleton Barry, opened on 15 May 1858, and its façade, foyer and auditorium are the ones you walk through today. It's Grade I listed.
During the Second World War it was used as a dance hall. It reopened for opera and ballet on 20 February 1946, with The Sleeping Beauty. In 1997 it closed for a rebuild and reopened in December 1999, and almost everything apart from the old auditorium, foyer and front dates from then, including the glass and iron Floral Hall, now the Paul Hamlyn Hall, and the Linbury Theatre.
Who performs here
The Royal Ballet, The Royal Opera and the Orchestra of the Royal Opera House are resident here, with visiting companies alongside. Downstairs, the Linbury Theatre seats up to 350, and the Clore Studio is the building's third, smallest space. Backstage tours run through most of the year, about an hour to an hour and a quarter, booked with the Royal Opera House.
Past productions and moments
- Handel's operas and oratorios (1730s), written for the first theatre on this site
- The Sleeping Beauty (1946), which reopened the building after the war
- The Royal Opera took its present name in 1968
Other venues of similar size
- London Coliseum, 2,359 seats on St Martin's Lane, the home of English National Opera and the closest match
- London Palladium, 2,292 seats on Argyll Street
- Apollo Victoria Theatre, 2,328 seats, opposite Victoria station
About FAQs
Is the Royal Opera House in the West End?
Yes, in Covent Garden, though with its own resident companies and a programme that changes week to week, it isn't a West End theatre in the usual sense.