LAVA Designs New National Stadium for Ethiopia

Ethiopian football and athletics fans will have a new FIFA and Olympic-standard 60,000 seat stadium in Addis Ababa thanks to a competition winning design combining local identity with new technology.

The international architecture competition for a national stadium and sports village, held by the Ethiopian  Federal Sport Commission to build a new 60,000 seat football stadium in Ethiopia has been won by Australian-German architect Lava.

Work on the ground in capital Addis Ababa is due to start in 2014 and will also include an athletics track, an aquatics canter as well as a residential village along with sports halls and arena.

Lava is carrying out the work with local practice JDAW and the stadium is designed to reference the country’s excavated architecture. Lava director Chris Bosse said: “We have gone back to the very origin of stadium design with a sunken arena surrounded by grandstands formed from excavated material.”

The façade material that wraps the stadium is inspired by the Massob, an Ethiopian communal serving basket made from woven grass. The country’s main export – coffee beans – is also referenced in the façade system.