Chinese leaders plan to build a state-of-the-art national theatre next to Tiananmen Square to boost Beijing's international status but leading mainland architects have attacked the proposal as expensive and elitist.
The design by French architect Paul Andreu is avant-garde, with the building in the shape of a giant bubble made of glass and titanium. Situated in the centre of a man-made lake, visitors will enter the theatre via an underwater passage.
The National Grand Theatre - as it is called - will have a 2,500- seat opera house, a 2,000-seat music hall, a 1,200-seat theatre and a smaller venue of 300 to 500 seats for experimental theatre.
With an estimated price tag of three billion yuan (HK$2.8 bil lion) and a 10-hectare site, some say it will overshadow the Sydney Opera House and the Lincoln Centre in New York.
Work is due to begin in April despite widespread controversy over the plan.
Four leading mainland architects voiced their opposition in an open letter published in the Journal of Ar chitectural Studies.