Dong’an Lake Sports Center Chengdu, China

By gmp Architects

After winning the competition in 2018, the architects von Gerkan, Marg and Partners (gmp) have completed the Chengdu Sports Center (also known as Dong’an Lake Sports Park), an ensemble consisting of three new sports and leisure buildings in the Chinese metropolis Chengdu. It will be the venue for the coming FISU World University Games. The new sports center will become the focal point of Dong’an New Town – an area situated by the water to the west of the city center, in the heart of the Longquan district. The ensemble comprises a group of buildings around a central plaza, consisting of a sports hall with 18,000 seats, a multifunctional hall for culture, leisure, and popular sports, as well as an indoor pool complex with two 50-meter swimming pools.

The three buildings each feature a square footprint and are linked via a shared plinth which, towards the open courtyard area, accommodates indoor training facilities for basketball, table tennis, and badminton, as well as restaurants, shops, and parking. The ensemble can be seen from afar owing to the louver-style facades with folded, shiny silver aluminum elements turning towards the center of the facade, thereby revealing the form and colour of the externally placed escape stairwells. Each building has its own colour code that facilitates visitors’ orientation on the site and inside the halls. The louver structure of the facade continues on the roof as a fifth facade, which means that the technical structures on the roof are enclosed and the emblematic appearance of the

ensemble remains visible also from above. The entrance zones of each building are marked by narrow recesses.

Two large urban traffic axes border the site to the north and west. In terms of urban design, the Dong’an Lake Sports Park accommodates this situation by guiding its visitors from there directly to the site. At the same time, the ensemble creates interesting interior and exterior spaces through the offset arrangement of the three buildings in conjunction with the neighboring stadium. The calm interior provides spaces for meeting and for movement. This creates a diverse functional mix, with training facilities for performance and popular sports as well as a new social meeting place for the Longquan district.