While the northern facade looks rather closed because of its pink-gray granite colonnade and its adherence to the consistently large height of the buildings on Bertoldstraße, the western side offers a wide glass front and includes the main entrance.

It is 47 m long, 19 m wide, and has an average height of 19 m. The hall was named after Freiburg's former mayor Rolf Böhme, in whose term the Konzerthaus was built.

Event organizers can enter the inner courtyard via Sedanstraße and access the stage on ground level through the back wall of the main hall.

However, these plans, the so-called Bahnhofsplatte, never got beyond the status of a pilot project, as there were enormous building costs of approximately 86 million Deutsche Mark (roughly 44 million EUR) and the Deutsche Bundesbahn did not intend to finance large-scale projects due to the increasing competition presented by air travel.

As the building fit in the existing architecture of the city instead of towering above it and as the construction costs came to an estimated 44 million dollars, the study was considerably more realistic and adequate to the scarce public financial resources than the failed plans for the Bahnhofsplatte project.

An architectural design competition with relatively strict rules was organized in order to realize the project and avoid proposals with high-cost risk.

Not only the members of the Southwest German Radio Symphony Orchestra, who are frequent tenants, with 150 rehearsals per year, but also the Berlin Philharmonic, during their first guest appearance, complained about poor conditions.

For that reason, in 2001, after a testing phase of two years, thirty circular acoustic canvases, which can be adjusted in height, were installed at the ceiling above the stage area.

Together with twelve mobile folding screens, they increased the investment by 800,000 DM (roughly 409,000 EUR) for the Freiburg Management and Marketing association.