Oper Frankfurt

Stand on the pavement and look up at the glass. It runs the length of the building like a shop window for an entire city. Behind it, golden shapes float near the ceiling, as if a storm cloud had been caught and gilded. In the evening, when the foyer lights come on, the whole front glows amber over the square. Trams clatter past. Commuters cut across the paving stones. This is Oper Frankfurt, and it does not hide what it is doing.

The building you are facing is not one theatre but two. It is a shared complex, the municipal stages of Frankfurt, home to both the opera company and the city's drama theatre, Schauspiel Frankfurt. The long glass foyer opened in the early 1960s and joined the houses behind a single modern face. At the time, it was a statement. Post-war Frankfurt wanted to look open, democratic and forward-facing. A wall of glass, where anyone passing could see the audience, said exactly that.

Now look again at those golden clouds. They are a work called Goldwolken, Golden Clouds, by the Hungarian-Swiss artist Zoltán Kemény. They are made of metal, shaped and finished in gold, and hung in the open air of the foyer. Many visitors walk under them without looking up. From outside, at dusk, they read best, hovering above the heads of the crowd like something from a dream sequence. They are one of the most recognisable artworks in any German theatre lobby.

Here is the first surprise. Frankfurt already has a grand opera house — and the opera company does not live in it. A short walk north stands the Alte Oper, the Old Opera, a palace of sandstone from the late nineteenth century. Bombing in the Second World War left it a burnt-out shell. For decades it stood ruined. When it finally reopened in 1981, it came back as a concert hall, not an opera house. The opera had already moved here.

The opera's new home was an older theatre on this square, a playhouse from the early twentieth century. After the war, the city rebuilt it for opera, and performances resumed in the early 1950s. Then the glass foyer came in the 1960s and wrapped everything together. So the building in front of you carries several layers. Behind the modern glass sit traces of an earlier theatre. The square itself was once called Theaterplatz, Theatre Square, and was later renamed after the former chancellor Willy Brandt.

The second surprise is a darker story. In 1987, a fire broke out inside the opera house. It was arson. The blaze destroyed the stage and much of the auditorium. The company did not stop. It kept performing in other venues while the house was rebuilt, and the opera reopened in the early 1990s. If the auditorium looks newer than the foyer, that is why. Fire took the heart of the building, and the city gave it a new one.

What happens inside matters more than the walls. From the late 1970s into the late 1980s, the music director here was the conductor Michael Gielen. His years became famous across Europe for daring stagings. Directors treated opera as living theatre, not as a museum piece. Audiences sometimes argued, and sometimes walked out. But a generation of opera makers watched Frankfurt closely. That appetite for bold productions is still part of the company's identity today.

In recent years, the house has been named Opera House of the Year several times by the German magazine Opernwelt, which polls critics every season. That is a remarkable record for a company working in a building of glass and concrete, without gilded boxes or a famous chandelier. Frankfurt is better known for banks than for arias. Yet in the opera world, the name of this city often comes up for the quality of its singing and its staging.

One reason is the way the company works. Oper Frankfurt runs a repertory system. That means a resident ensemble of singers performs many different operas across a season, often switching works from one night to the next. You might hear the same voice as a tragic heroine on Tuesday and a comic maid on Friday. The orchestra is unusual too. The same musicians play in the pit for the opera and also give the city's long-running Museum concerts, a symphonic series with roots in the nineteenth century.

Now turn around and look at the square. Close by stands a giant blue Euro sign ringed with yellow stars. It sits beside the tower that was once the headquarters of the European Central Bank. Here, money and music share the same pavement. Bankers in suits cross paths with ticket holders in their evening clothes. Between the skyscrapers and the opera glass, the square is a small portrait of Frankfurt itself — a financial capital that also keeps a serious stage.

The future of this building is an open question. The complex is ageing, and its technical systems need major work. Frankfurt has spent years debating whether to renovate or to rebuild, and the city has moved toward plans for new buildings for the opera and the theatre. Nothing about that changes tonight. But it does mean the glass front you see now may not last forever. Looking at it today, you see a chapter that is still being written.

If you have time, step a few paces toward the green strip of parkland nearby. These gardens follow the line of the old city walls, which were taken down long ago and replaced with trees and paths. From there, the opera's glass sits between leaves and towers. On a performance night, watch the foyer fill. People gather with drinks, a bell sounds, and the crowd drains away inside. For a moment the golden clouds hang over an empty room.

So take one last look. The glass, the floating gold, the trams sliding past, the Euro sign glowing blue in the corner of your eye. This is not a palace built to impress from a distance. It is a working theatre, set right at street level, where the city can look in. As you walk away, listen for the tram bells and the traffic. Somewhere behind that glass, an orchestra may already be tuning up.