Maine Savings Amphitheater Rooftop Premium Seating
Maine Savings Amphitheater Two rooftop skydecks add 500 premium seats above the stage at Maine's largest amphitheater
Two rooftop skydecks sit on the structures flanking the stage at the Maine Savings Amphitheater, adding 498 seats to a venue that already held 16,289. Nineteen suites across the two roofs, with sightlines straight down onto the stage and the city and the Penobscot River behind it.
The decks are built for weather and wear. Cumaru wood parquet pavers carry the furniture. Cor-ten planters divide seating from circulation and separate one seating type from another without resorting to railings. Cupped PAC-CLAD metal panels clad the structures, catching light differently as the evening goes. Harbour Outdoor sofas and cocktail tables run between the dining areas.
Putting 498 people on a roof means getting them up and down. Ervin Architecture extended the existing stairways, added a new stair and elevator on the railroad side, and ran an elevated catwalk along Main Street. The east deck opened for the 2026 season as the Après Sky Deck, with upgrades sold at the concourse booths.
Location
Bangor, Maine
STYLE
Contemporary
Services
Architecture, Engineering, Interior Design, Site Planning, Life Safety Design
CATEGORY
PROJECT SIZE
30,000 FT² / 2788 M²
Premium and VIP Seating Design for an Outdoor Music Venue
Premium Seating at an Open-Air Venue
Two rooftop skydecks flank the stage at the Maine Savings Amphitheater, adding 498 seats and nineteen suites above a venue that already held 16,289. The east deck opened for the 2026 season. Equal parts luxury suite and Rock Box, with personalized food and drink service, from a vantage point that looks down on the stage with the City of Bangor and the Penobscot River behind it.
Life Safety Before Design
Ervin Architecture has designed every phase of the amphitheater since 2017, and the skydecks build on that work. Seating types had to be separated from circulation on open roofs with nothing to do it with. Cor-ten planters solved it and became the signature element of both decks. Harbour Outdoor sofas and cocktail tables sit on cumaru wood parquet pavers from Bison. The rooftop structures are clad in a cupped PAC-CLAD metal panel system that holds texture in daylight and shimmers under the venue’s night lighting.
Separating Seating from Circulation
Putting 498 people on a roof is a life-safety problem before it is a design problem. EA developed the egress plan in direct coordination with the Maine State Fire Marshal’s office: existing stairways extended, a new stair and elevator on the railroad side, an elevated catwalk along Main Street connecting the structure to the Lawn. This is the work that determines whether premium seating gets approved at all, and it is what EA is hired for in live entertainment design.
Designed to Be Sold
The east deck operates as the Après Sky Deck, a branded premium product that opened for the June 2026 season. Patrons buy the upgrade at booths in the northeast and northwest concourses during the show, which means the deck cannot be a sealed enclave reached only by ticket holders who planned ahead. It has to be findable from the general concourse and reachable mid-performance without crossing back through secured areas. Premium seating that people cannot get to does not sell, and the circulation that makes it sellable is a design decision, not a ticketing one.
Every Phase Since 2017
The amphitheater opened in 2010 as the Bangor Waterfront Pavilion with a capacity of 8,000. Ervin Architecture has designed every phase since 2017, including the 2018 expansion and the permanent stadium seating, and the skydecks are the most recent layer on a venue that has been growing for fifteen years. By 2026 it had been rebuilt to an astonishing 16,289 fans as the venue’s total capacity in a town of only 30,000 people. Designing successive phases of the same building is a different discipline from designing one — each addition has to work with what the last one left behind, and with a venue that cannot close.
