Zaha Hadid Architects design the world’s greenest football stadium

Planning permission has been granted to build Forest Green Rovers’ Eco Park, the first football stadium made almost out of wood in the world, which is designed by Zaha Hadid Architects.

The Eco Park stadium of English League Two side Forest Green Rovers is going to be a 5,000 capacity wooden stadium on Junction 13 of the M5, along with landscaped parking as well as two pitches, one of which is a 4G playing area, with available access for the local community.

Considered as “the greenest football stadium in the world”, by the club Forest Green Rovers’ website, the new stadium can be built within the next three years.

Forest Green Rovers’ Eco Park

In an interview on the club’s website, Chairman Dale Vince said that it had taken five years for the club to finally get approval, with the first attempt rejected by Stroud District Council in June of last year.

He said, “It may take us some years. I think it may take us one year of detailed design work. This is just an outline planning application. The shortest case is three years if we started soon.”

Forest Green Rovers, the currently sixth team in League Two, became the first vegan football club in the world in 2017.

Zaha Hadid Architects, founded by the late Iraqi-British architect Zaha Hadid, is assigned to design 950 projects in 44 countries. The company opened an office in Dubai in 2016, the same year when Hadid died.

Dubai developer Omniyat began the handover of commercial units at The Opus – the only building in Dubai created by Hadid in October 2018. M.E Dubai, forming part of the outstanding Business Bay property, the first M.E by Meliá hotel in the Middle East and also the only hotel in the world to be designed both inside and outside by the late Zaha Hadid, is planned to open in February 2020.

The s842-metre-long Sheikh Zayed Bridge of Abu Dhabi is also designed by Hadid, who took inspiration from sand dunes in order to create the structure’s curved arches.