You’d expect something like this from a team named the Forest Green Rovers: The British National League soccer team in Nailsworth, Gloucestershire, is building a first-of-its-kind 5,000-seat stadium made entirely of wood.
Everything will be wood — and the fireproof facility will be powered entirely by sustainable energy sources, according to Dezeen, the UK’s influential architecture and design magazine.
“The importance of using wood is not only that it’s a naturally occurring material, it has very low carbon content — about as low as it gets for a building material,” Forest Green Rovers chairman and owner Dale Vince said. “Our new stadium will have the lowest carbon content of any stadium in the world. This really will be the greenest football stadium in the world.”
The London-based firm Zaha Hadid Architects beat out more than 40 other firms from Europe and the United States for the right to design the facility. The company’s previous projects include the London Aquatics Centre for the 2012 Olympics, and it is working on a stadium for the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar.
Construction is expected to take up to three years, reports London’s Daily Express, because of the project’s complexity. The facility will be the centerpiece of a so-called eco park under development by Vince, who also owns the green energy firm Ecotricity.
No word yet on whether U.S. sports teams will follow Forest Green’s lead. But think about the tourism opportunities a facility like this would create.
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