Article about the firm/London Olympics
KC firm Populous is a major player at London Olympics
By JAMES A. FUSSELL
The Kansas City Star
The 2012 Olympic Games may be in London, but we have our barbecue-stained fingerprints all over them.
Although nearly 20 architecture firms have worked on the Olympics, none is as involved as Populous, the world-renowned sports architecture firm in the River Market.
The Olympic stadium?
Designed by Populous.
Most of the venues?
Designed by a team led by Populous.
The Olympic Park, Olympic Village and International Broadcast Center?
Take a bow, Kansas City.
Over the last five years, more than 100 architects with Populous â which changed its name from HOK Sport in 2009 â have created more than 20,000 architectural drawings for the Summer Games.
The construction value of their work exceeds $1 billion.
âThe Olympics is like taking 26 world championships and hosting them simultaneously in one city in a two week period,â said Jeff Keas, who was the first Populous architect sent to London in 2007. âIt is considered the largest peacetime logistical undertaking in the world.â
But, you know, no pressure.
By all accounts the company can handle it.
âThey are generally regarded as the premier architecture firm that specializes in sports facility and stadium design,â said Scott Frank, spokesman for the American Institute of Architects in Washington, D.C. âThey have a very good reputation.â
The company is so involved in the Summer Games, which open July 27, that it became an official Olympic sponsor, a first for an architecture firm. But then Populous is no stranger to the Olympics. It has worked on 10 Olympic Games and is the only firm in the world to have designed three Olympic stadiums (London, Sydney and Sochi, Russia, host of the 2014 Winter Olympics).
This time, the games carry a theme of sustainability. With the help of two London firms, Populous designed more than 100 temporary venues with small carbon footprints. Instead of concrete and steel, theyâre made from aluminum, cables and fabric. Because they can be removed, reused and recycled, such structures wonât become costly white elephants after the games like many previous Olympic venues.
Thereâs another benefit that should make the Games more interesting to the estimated 4.7 billion television viewers. The buildingsâ temporary nature allows them to be placed in historic areas, offering background vistas of such London landmarks as Buckingham Palace, Windsor Castle and No. 10 Downing Street.
âWe were really able to showcase this city, which has a remarkable history and culture,â said Jerry Anderson, a senior principal with Populous who has been working on and off in London since 2003.
âFor instance, we put the equestrian venue in Greenwich Park, site of one of the royal palaces,â Anderson said. âThe pitch we made to the International Olympic Committee is that there was a great history of equestrian events. They asked what that was, and we said, âHenry the VIII used to hold jousts there.â â
Populous built the beach volleyball venue in Horse Guards Parade, a historic site by both St. Jamesâs Palace and Buckingham Palace, where monarchsâ red-coated soldiers practiced on horseback for generations, Anderson said.
âImmediately behind are the Cabinet war rooms where Winston Churchill managed World War II,â he said. âOn the other side is No. 10 Downing Street, which basically looks right out at the venue itself.â
Populous erected a temporary rowing venue at Eton Dorney, a prep school at the foot of Windsor Castle, the queenâs weekend home. Venues for road cycling and the triathlon â including thousands of temporary seats and buildings for athletes and broadcasters â stand ready in historic Hyde Park.
Architects also designed courses for bicycle races that pass by Big Ben (soon to be renamed Elizabeth Tower in honor of the queen) and the Tower Bridge.
Showcasing a city in the background of Olympic events can generate significant tourism, said Keas, who lived for extended stretches in Atlanta and Sydney for the 1996 and 2000 Summer Games and now supervises a team of 80 architects in London.
The best example, Keas said, was the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona, Spain.
âThere was a famous photograph of a British diver that ran on the cover of Time magazine,â Keas said. âYou could see the diving platform and the diver (arching her back in the middle of a dive) against a brilliant blue sky. In the background you saw Barcelona and the famous Sagrada Familia church.
âThey want to do the same (type of) thing in London. They want something that makes people say, âOh, thatâs London!â It would be even better if they said: âOh, thatâs London. And I want to go there!â â
The Olympic stadium Populous created for London includes a lightweight frame and a white roof. Hundreds of long, multicolored fabric ribbons hang from its exterior, an effect that âgives the building a real dynamic personality and appearance,â said Anderson. âBut itâs also functional in that it was designed to cut the wind or any kind of breezes that might be blowing around the stadium. It basically breaks up the wind patterns.â
Critics are heaping praise on some venues created by other firms: the wavy-roofed Velodrome by Hopkins Architects of Britain and, especially, on the curvaceous London Aquatics Centre, designed by Zaha Hadid Architects. But the main stadium by Populous has its detractors.
Tom Dyckhoff, architecture critic of The Times of London, called it âtragically underwhelming.â
âSparse, direct and unfussy,â British architect Piers Gough told The Guardian.
âIt demonstrates an obvious interest in establishing an economy of means and is such the antithesis of the 2008 Olympic Stadium in Beijing,â wrote Ellis Woodman of Building Design magazine. âBut while thatâs an achievement, itâs not an architectural achievement.â
On the other hand, the owners of Beijingâs stadium, aka the Birdâs Nest, have not found a permanent use for it and are struggling to meet its $10 million annual operating costs.
London, which already has a national stadium â the new Wembley Stadium, also designed by Populous â didnât want to be burdened with the same problem. Organizers asked Populous for a better option.
âWe designed the Olympic stadium with quite a bit of flexibility,â said Keas. âWhile it can hold 80,000 people, 55,000 of the seats can be removed after the games, leaving a much more usable 25,000-seat stadium. If you can take two-thirds of it away after the Olympics, youâve just saved two-thirds of your life-cycle costs.â
But that doesnât mean the stadium looks temporary, said Anderson. The city hopes to attract a permanent tenant, possibly a soccer team.
âYou really wouldnât know that this is a place that could be unbolted and disassembled,â he said. âIt looks and feels like a permanent stadium.â
To reach James A. Fussell, call 816-234-4460 or send email to jfussell@kcstar.com.
Posted on Sun, Jul. 01, 2012 10:30 PM
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