National Arena Scotland 
Glasgow, UK, 2005-2008
Foster + Partners

Image Source: Brady Peters / Foster + Partners

Scotland’s National Arena will provide a new indoor venue for concerts and performances in the cultural and event hub of Glasgow’s Scottish Exhibition and Conference Centre. The new arena is designed to be a highly flexible building and accommodate a wide range of events from pop concerts to theatrical shows.  The angle of the roof gives a low profile facing onto the adjacent expressway.  However, at the other side of the building the facade has a 40 metre high front elevation.  The roof of the auditorium is designed to be a spectacular circular spaceframe with a 120 metre diameter with expressed diagonal structural elements.

Image Source: Brady Peters / Foster + Partners

I worked on the design, set out and rationalization of the seating bowl, facade, and roof structure.  The seating bowl was designed using parametric software in Microstation.  The facade designed as a series of cones – rotational surfaces – related to the seating bowl – so that the facade could be constructed from simple planar elements.  Many different designs for the roof structure were explored.  Many different variants of a spaceframe system were studied.  This used a custom written computer program that I wrote that linked to a parametric model of the design surface of the roof.

Image Source: Brady Peters / Foster + Partners

Image Source: Brady Peters / Foster + Partners