Gut renovation plan for New York Philharmonic home scrapped

The New York Philharmonic and Lincoln Center have abandoned a long-planned gut renovation of the orchestra's home.

A $100 million gift toward the building's renovation was announced in May 2015, and what had been Avery Fisher Hall was renamed David Geffen Hall that September. An architectural team was announced a few months later.

The 2,738-person-capacity hall opened in 1962 and has long been regarded as inadequate. The orchestra said in January it and Lincoln Center had raised nearly $300 million for the project, expected to cost at least $500 million.

In a statement Tuesday, the orchestra and Lincoln Center said they will focus on "phased renovations" that include a "reimagined hall configuration," ''a focus on acoustics" and "enlivening the hall's lobbies."