A new multifunctional sporting arena, the SAP Garden, has opened in Munich, extending the architectural legacy of the city’s Olympic Park.
SAP Garden, a major addition to Munich’s ensemble of sports facilities, has opened to the public.
The arena is the new home of the Red Bull München ice hockey team and it also serves as an additional home venue for FC Bayern Basketball. It has a total floor area of 62,500 square metres, including four ice rinks, and provides space for 11,500 spectators. In addition to the sports facilities themselves, the arena contains eleven VIP boxes, shops for official team merchandise, offices and conference rooms and a parking garage.
SAP Garden is located in Munich’s Olympiapark, at a site formerly occupied by the Radstadion velodrome. Designed by Copenhagen-based architects 3XN and with engineering by Buro Happold, the arena is a significant contribution to the robust infrastructure for sports and leisure in Munich.
The architects and engineers responded to the manicured landscape of the park as well as the presence of nearby sports facilities designed by Günter Behnisch and Frei Otto for the 1972 Summer Olympics, which have become landmarks over the past four decades. 3XN devised an asymmetrical, organic form for the building that resonates with Behnisch and Otto’s project for the Olympics but that also echoes the gentle slopes of the surrounding green space. The architects’ sensitivity to topography results in a building that seems to dissolve into the landscape.
Jan Ammundsen, senior partner at 3XN, said: “We are pleased to be opening the new SAP Garden arena, marking a new era for sport in the city of Munich. The project has been a meaningful opportunity for us to extend the architectural legacy of the Olympic Park, seamlessly fitting a modern sports facility into the existing landscape. We have also been inspired by the opportunity to design for community. There is a reason why we go to arenas, why it is so important to be able to go in person: we want to share in and experience a feeling. Our goal with SAP Garden was to make this experience something that is special, something that you cannot have anywhere else.”
Careful attention to topography in the architectural design posed a challenge for Buro Happold’s structural engineering team. 3XN’s interest in preserving the continuity of the landscape of the park as well as a strict height restriction of 21.5 metres, so as not to disrupt sightlines to Behnisch’s Olympiahalle, became productive constraints for Buro Happold.
The solution was to place most of the arena’s spaces underground, which necessitated excavation below the water table to lay the foundation, a move that posed its own challenges in terms of structure and flood prevention. A neighbouring training complex is entirely underground and its surface is crossed by pedestrian pathways. This complex required a structural system that can withstand the load of earth as well as the movement of people overhead.
Buro Happold CEO Oliver Plunkett said: “SAP Garden represents a major addition to Munich’s landscape of sports and entertainment spaces. It combines a high level of technical performance and flexibility with a close relationship to the natural context in which it is located, ensuring it stands out by blending in. Olympiapark is home to landmark projects by Frei Otto, who collaborated closely with Buro Happold in the firm’s earliest days and we are proud to have contributed to this space where people will come together and share in the joy and excitement – and adrenaline – that comes from great sporting events.”
SAP Garden’s visual and spatial continuity with the landscape of the Olympiapark is also evident in the arena’s roof. A 60-metre hill nearby provides views of the arena and the parkland around it. To protect this vista, Buro Happold decided to place mechanical, electrical and plumbing equipment below the roof rather than on top of it. Higher levels in the interior, suspended partly from the main roof structure, are devoted to equipment that depends on the intake of fresh air, while machinery for creating and preserving ice for the rinks are placed at lower levels. Buro Happold’s solution for the underground ice rinks keeps the playing field in perfect thermal condition while providing a cozy atmosphere for the other areas.
