The Typology of Polish Sporting Venues
When we hear the words ‘sporting venue’, we usually imagine a football stadium – often one of the spectacular arenas from the times of Euro 2012. But sport is not just football, and buildings meant for training and sport competitions can take various different forms.
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Białystok city stadium, designed by Kuryłowicz & Associates, 2007-2014, photo: Kuryłowicz & Associates / www.apaka.com.pl
The organising, together with Ukraine, of the UEFA European Championship in 2012 changed the way Poles understand the word ‘stadium’. Although only three new arenas were raised for the event (in Warsaw, Gdańsk and Wrocław; in Poznań, a previously existing facility was modernised for the occasion), it’s been commonly believed since that a stadium must constitute a large-scale, showy mass. Indeed, the red-and-white ‘basket’ – the National Stadium in Warsaw – and the amber-like Energa Stadium Gdańsk became well-known, easily recognisable objects.
However, the two are not particularly representative of the architecture of contemporary football arenas and stadiums, which combine turf with athletic facilities. Enormous arenas meant to fit 60,000 viewers are built relatively rarely, but smaller city or club stadiums tend to be no less interesting. Despite their unique forms, their scale is suited not only to local needs, but also to the surroundings, as exemplified by the Białystok city stadium, built in 2014 and designed by Kuryłowicz & Associates, surrounded with an openwork structure made of steel pillars; the Legia stadium in Warsaw (designed by JSK Architects, finished in 2011), covered with a zigzagged roof made of half-transparent membrane; the minimalist Arena Lublin (designed by Estudio Lamela); and the Silesian Stadium in Chorzów, rebuilt in 2014 (designed by gmp Architekten von Gerkan, Marg und Partner).
A hall like a sculpture
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Hala Olivia in Gdańsk, photo: Deway/Wikimedia.org
One may be inclined to think that a sporting hall doesn’t need to have an unconventional form – after all, it’s just ‘packaging’ for the interior, which is meant to serve important functions. Thankfully, looking in the history of Polish architecture, sporting halls used to be designed by creators endowed with huge imaginations and the ability to contain functional spaces in extraordinary masses. Such objects undoubtedly include the Centennial Hall in Wrocław (designed by Max Berg in 1911-1913), which figures on the UNESCO World Heritage List; the iconic Spodek in Katowice, put into operation in 1971; Hala Olivia in Gdańsk, opened one year later and designed by the same architects, Maciej Gintowt and Maciej Krasiński; and Ergo Arena in Gdańsk, designed by Jerzy Turzeniecki in 1974.
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AWF sports hall in Poznań, designed by Neostudio Architects, 2013, fot. z archiwum Neostudio Architekci
Looking at contemporary realisations of similar facilities, it’s clearly visible that the tradition of designing sculpture-like structures has passed. That, however, doesn’t mean that among newly built halls, there are none worthy of attention. Ever since its opening in 2018, the Cracovia 1906 Centennial Hall with the Sports Center for the Handicapped in Kraków (designed by Design Studio Lewicki Łatak) has been winning numerous awards, both as a functional venue available for all, in which even the roof is usable, and as a building skilfully inscribed into the surroundings of Kraków’s Błonia Park.
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Na Skarpie (On the Bank) Sports Hall in Bytom, photo: Krzysztof Smyk
What’s also interesting is the raw, concrete mass of the Na Skarpie (On the Bank) Sports Hall, built in 2010 in Bytom according to the design of Zbigniew Maćko’s studio, as is the light, transparent hall of Poznań’s AWF, designed by Neostudio Architects in 2013.
Swimming under a roof
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The Olympic Swimming Pool in Opole, designed by Studium, Rafał Maliński, Malwina Łazęcka, 2013, photo: Studium’s press materials
When London hosted the Summer Olympics in 2012, from among the plethora of facilities built for the occasion one evoked particular interest – a wavy concrete mass of the London Aquatics Centre designed by Zaha Hadid. A similar thing happened four years prior in Beijing, where a swimming pool building raised for the Olympics ravished with its light, illuminated construction, looking as if it were composed of water bubbles. While there are no such glamorous pools in Poland, Polish architects, too, are capable of giving interesting forms to swimming centres.
The Kontrapunkt V studio endowed the swimming pool of the Medical University of Warsaw with a green lounge and finished the façade off not only with glass and rusty steel, but also with a climbing wall. Architects from Studium went even further with their Olympic Swimming Pool in Opole. They hid the facility, opened in 2013, behind a wavy brick wall with dozens of round windows. Moreover, one cannot forget about the venues that caused enormous excitement in the 1990s: aquaparks. These facilities, extended with recreational zones, were supposed to constitute ‘better versions’ of swimming pools in the times of transformation. Not only did they offer more attractions, but they also tempted with their characteristic look, notably with the mazes of colourful slides intertwining outside the buildings.
Architecture for sailors
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Malta Regatta Course in Poznań, designed by Klemens Mikuła, photo: Jakub Kaczmarczyk / PAP
The Malta Regatta Course in Poznań, designed by Klemens Mikuła and built between 1981 and 1990, is one of the most interesting realisations ranked as postmodernist. The complex, including a regatta course with stands, an Event Service Centre and a pavilion with competitors’ changing rooms constitutes a collection of colourful masses, each of which refers in a different way to the theme of sailing. Although the very unconventional venue has successfully served its function, it hasn’t found any followers. Aquatics venues have been designed quite differently so far. Interestingly, even though there are relatively few architectural masses designed for sailors, almost all that do appear win general recognition and numerous architectural awards. That’s what happened in 2012, when the city harbour in Bydgoszcz was put into operation. The venue combines a base for boaters, a yacht harbour, a hotel and public space.
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A base for canoeists in Augustów, designed by Przemysław Sokołowski (PSBA), Jakub Zygmunt (INOONI), Martyna Lenart-Zygmunt, photo: Bartosz Dworski
Katarzyna Wojciechowska-Rokicka and Tomasz Rokicki, who inscribed the wooden mass into the space of Wyspa Młyńska, discovered an interesting way to combine sport and the public functions of the venue. Two years later, we could admire the Lake Ukiel Year-Round Sport and Recreation Centre in Olsztyn (designed by Dżus GK Architects). Another successful design was the aquatics centre and base for canoeists in Augustów (by PSBA Przemysław Sokołowski Architectural Studio and INOONI Jakub Zygmunt), a wooden pavilion complex picturesquely harmonising with the Netta riverbank.
Sport on the block
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Bemowo Urban Sports’ Square, photo: Sławomir Kamiński / AG
Sport requires practice. Before one becomes a medallist, one needs to catch the sporting bug, get to like physical exercise and have a chance to choose a suitable discipline. That’s why it’s so important to build easily available, multifunctional recreational and sporting venues that might encourage people to someday undertake professional sport by offering a convenient space for fun, games and physical activities. A great example thereof is the Urban Sports’ Square, built among blocks of flats in Warsaw’s Bemowo, initiated by the activist Grzegorz Gąsek – who inspired a large circle of young architects to join the project. The modern, appealing space offers plenty of spots where the young and the slightly older can engage in physical exercise.
Marlena Wolnik, too, had a wide range of users in mind when designing the Centre for Local Activity (CAL). It’s a flexible concept, developed in such a way that its different variants can be realised on various housing estates: among blocks, among greenery, in city centres and on the suburbs. The first CAL was raised in 2019 in Rybnik. It’s a complex of wooden masses that can serve as a place for physical activity as well as for meet-ups, festivals and relaxation. The same applies to the recreational space by Lake Paprocany in Tychy, which has been undergoing modernisation for several years and has recently been extended with a canoe harbour, serving as a place for both sport and rest.
Originally written in Polish, translated by Anna Potoczny, Jun 2021
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