London 2012 Olympic Stadium

Embedded in the London Games design parameters was the need to provide for the future, ensuring the lasting legacy of a major event, which requires transformation of the city and its venues – challenging the concept of building permanence. 

To achieve a balance between the immediate needs of the large Games stadium against a long-term, small-scale venue, Populous embraced the opportunity to develop the architectural language of venue design. We progressed a new theory of ‘embracing the temporary’, by exploring form, materials, structure and operational systems to bring a structured palette of elements into a cohesive design.

Simple legible forms developed, minimizing the physical weight, fabrication time and embodied energy of each component – bringing together a compact structure formed by demountable connections. This not only enabled the overlay of theatre and spectacle in staging the Opening and Closing Ceremonies for the 80,000 capacity venue, but also promoted the possibility of transformation after the Games down to a minimum 25,000 seat venue form.

The London Olympic Stadium was sited on a diamond-shaped island between two existing waterways, within the southern section of the new Olympic Park. The seating bowl was compact, bringing all 80,000 spectators far closer to the event than in previous Games venues. The design made full use of the site’s island situation, providing a complete circuit of spectator podium concourse around the stadium, connected by bridges to the main park. This podium concourse promoted the carnival nature of the event, with a perimeter array of spectator facilities, particularly retail and food service, distributed along the natural boundary of the water’s edge. During the three hours of an athletics event, spectators were free to move from their seats out onto the podium to visit these colorful clusters of concession pods, and view the other activities in the adjacent park and venues across the waterways.

The key sustainability criteria of reduce, reuse and recycle were adopted to create a compact, flexible and lightweight design. The main Stadium structure was light and elegant, clearly expressed by the external diagonal articulation of the white tubular steel of the roof and the internal slender black steel supporting the temporary upper seating tier. Between these two frames lay the concourse facade, the full height ribbon sections of the fabric ‘wrap’. The black and white seats provided a neutral backdrop for the interior color of the spectator facilities and pathways, and the animation that spectators brought to the event.