David H. Koch Theater

Stand on the plaza for a moment and listen. Water rises and falls in the round fountain at the centre. Footsteps cross the pale stone. To your left, if you face the great arched windows of the opera house, a long, calm facade of travertine columns catches the light. That is the David H. Koch Theater, a house built for dance, and for many decades one of the most important ballet stages in the world.

The building opened in 1964 under a different name — the New York State Theater. The state of New York helped pay for it. Part of the reason was the World's Fair, which was held in Queens that same year. The theater was meant to give the fair's visitors a cultural venue in Manhattan. So from its first season, this was a public project, tied to the ambitions of the state as much as the city.

The architect was Philip Johnson. He was one of the most influential American architects of the twentieth century, known for glass, steel, and a cool, classical sense of order. Here he worked in close conversation with two people who would shape the building's soul. One was George Balanchine, the Russian-born choreographer. The other was Lincoln Kirstein, the writer and patron who had brought Balanchine to America in the 1930s.

Together, Balanchine and Kirstein had founded New York City Ballet. This theater was planned with that company in mind. Many accounts describe Balanchine giving input on the stage itself — how dancers would move across it, how they would be seen from the seats. That focus matters. Most grand theaters are designed first for opera, with dance as a guest. This house was designed with the dancer at its centre.

Now look at the whole complex around you. Lincoln Center did not grow here slowly. It was built in a single push in the late 1950s and 1960s, as part of an urban renewal plan championed by the city planner Robert Moses. The land was once a crowded, working neighbourhood known as San Juan Hill. Thousands of residents, many of them Black and Puerto Rican families, were displaced to make room. The beauty of this plaza sits on top of that story, and it is worth holding both in mind.

Here is a detail many visitors miss. The film West Side Story was partly shot in these streets before demolition. The cameras captured the old tenements just before the bulldozers arrived. So the musical that made this part of Manhattan famous on screen also became an unplanned record of the neighbourhood that the arts center replaced.

If you can step inside, the first great space is the Promenade. It is a tall, open hall that rises through several levels of balconies. The floors are travertine, the same warm stone you see outside. The balcony railings shine with a gold tone. Above, the ceiling glows with a gilded finish. At intermission, this room fills with people, and the effect is like a town square moved indoors.

At each end of the Promenade stand two huge white sculptures. Each one shows a pair of full-figured women, softly rounded, almost doll-like. They are enlarged versions of small works by Elie Nadelman, a Polish-born sculptor who worked in America in the early twentieth century. Kirstein admired Nadelman deeply. The giant figures were carved in marble from smaller originals, and they give the hall its strange, gentle, slightly playful mood.

Now the auditorium. Johnson gave it a horseshoe shape, with rings of balconies curving around the stage. That shape is old — it comes from the opera houses of Europe — but here it feels clean and modern. Look at the fronts of the rings. Small round lights are set along them like rows of jewels. When the house lights dim before a performance, those points of light fade slowly, and the whole room seems to hold its breath.

For many years, the theater shared its stage. New York City Opera was also a resident company here, for decades, before it left in 2011. Since then, the house has belonged most clearly to New York City Ballet. Each winter, the company performs Balanchine's version of The Nutcracker here. For many New York families, that production is a holiday ritual, passed from parents to children.

The current name arrived in 2008. The businessman and philanthropist David H. Koch made a major gift toward renovating the building, and the theater took his name. The renovation updated the auditorium and its technical systems. The naming has drawn debate over the years, because of the donor's political activity. Today, many dancers and longtime audiences still simply call it the State Theater, out of habit and affection.

If you step outside onto the balcony level, you get one of the best views of the plaza. From up there, you can see how Johnson's building answers its neighbours. The opera house sits at the back, with its tall arches. The concert hall stands across the fountain. Each building is different, yet all three share the same pale stone and the same quiet columns, so the plaza reads as one composed space.

Notice, too, how plain the outside of this theater is compared with the inside. From the plaza, it looks reserved, almost severe. Inside, it turns warm, gold, and theatrical. That contrast is deliberate. You walk from the open city into a jewel box, and the change of mood is part of the performance before any dancer appears.

Before you move on, look once more at the columns along the facade. Watch how the light changes on the travertine as the day goes on — cooler in the morning, warmer toward evening. Listen to the fountain again. Somewhere behind those walls, dancers are probably rehearsing right now, counting steps in a quiet studio. The building was made for them. And as you walk away across the stone, you are crossing the stage that frames their world.