Designs for 62,000-seat ground to be unveiled in coming weeks
Heatherwick Studio and Kansas-based stadium designer Manica have been appointed to design a new 62,000-seat stadium for Birmingham City Football Club.
The two architecture practices will collaborate with screenwriter and film director Stephen Knight, a lifelong Blues fan who has been named as lead writer on the next James Bond film.
The new stadium is expected to be more than double the size of the club’s 29,000-seat current home ground St Andrew’s, where it has been based since 1906.
It will be the centrepiece of the club’s plans for the so-called Sports Quarter in east Birmingham, which would include training facilities and other mixed-use real estate.
Images of the proposed stadium will be revealed in the coming weeks, according to the club.
Thomas Heatherwick, founder and design director of Heatherwick Studio, said: “This is going to be an incredible piece of city built around the passions of the Blues fans and the community.
“Not another spaceship dropped in a car park which feels dead when there’s not a match but somewhere that’s alive, connected, grown from the site and from the history of Birmingham itself. We couldn’t be prouder.”
David Manica, president and owner of Manica Architecture, added: “We’re thrilled to partner with Heatherwick Studio to design an extraordinary new home for Birmingham City Football Club.
“This new stadium will not only usher in a new era for Birmingham fans but will honour the Club’s passionate supporters and storied history.”
In April last year the club’s American owners Knighthead purchased a 48-acre former go-karting park in Bordesley and announced plans to move to the new location by August 2029 in a timeline which club chairman Tom Wagner admitted was “lunacy”.
He told the BBC at the time: “Five years from August, we’d be in. In a perfect world, if everyone works with us at the same pace, we’re willing to work.
“I’m going to keep saying it, even if it makes people sweat. A lot of it is outside of our control but that is the goal.”
Proposals for the wider mixed-use Sports Quarter development have been inspired by Manchester City’s Etihad campus, with Wagner previously estimating the scheme will cost between £2bn and £3bn.
Two years ago, Mace was appointed to complete work at St Andrew’s which was left in limbo by the collapse of Buckingham.
The firm’s consulting arm was already working on the job to carry out structural repairs to the lower tiers of the Kop and Tilton Road stands at St Andrew’s.
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