Football in South Korea is huge.
The country has produced football superstars known around the world,
and even co-hosted the World Cup in 2002.
But now, they’re taking things to a whole new level.
UNStudio and the team behind the iconic Johan Cruijff ArenA
in Amsterdam have teamed up to design the new Korean National Football Centre.
But this isn’t just a stadium. It’s a sprawling campus and training centre that pays homage to the
history of Korean football and sets the nation up to become a serious force at World Cups to come.
Today, South Korea is one of the top football teams in Asia.
And its football program has a legacy stretching all the
way back to the beginning of the country itself.
The Korea Football Association joined FIFA in 1948,
just after the Republic of Korea, also known as South Korea, was established.
In 1956, the national team played its first home match at the Dongdaemun Stadium.
Since then the team has played at a number of stadiums across the country,
rising to become a major player in the world of football.
Now South Korea is positioning itself as a global football destination. And it’s going all in.
Located eighty-five kilometres south of Seoul, the new Korean National Football Centre will
span a sweeping 450 square metres, featuring two new stadiums, a health and resort facility,
museum, training fields, a youth hostel and some retail space.
It’ll all be shared by the men’s national team, the women’s team and youth teams.
The winning masterplan was crafted by UNStudio,
who collaborated with experts across the world in the midst of the pandemic.
We have a particular way of working here in Holland and that is the, you know, you could say,
the collaborative integral total way of looking at it. You can bring all the
intelligence to the tactics of how to play.
And that similarly, in the way how we design.
At the core of the new centre’s design is a philosophy called “total football.”
Invented by the Dutch in the 70s, it’s a strategy where players aren’t restricted to
just one position on the field. Any player could take over the role of another throughout a match,
forcing teams to be creative, agile and know the game inside out.
UNStudio has let that philosophy guide its design,
creating a holistic approach to football, beyond just sport.
Health, wellness, science, technology and education are all woven throughout the masterplan.
At the heart of the centre will be this public plaza that’s surrounded by
three key pieces of architecture: an indoor stadium, outdoor stadium and museum.
The outdoor stadium will seat up to 1500 people and is designed to use local,
natural materials like timber and exposed stone wherever possible.
The design of these new stadiums was informed by
experts at top international football clubs, like this one.
Now, in the world of football, the Johan Cruiff ArenA is a pretty big deal. And UNStudio
worked directly with the stadium’s team to learn from their decades of experience.
Football is like religion. I mean, people want to be here,
they want to share that emotion. These are not just football players anymore,
they are heroes.
While the stadiums will give superfans a chance to watch some of their favourite players in action,
the training fields around the centre will help cultivate the next generation of footballers.
It’s not uncommon for training fields to be discovered by accident,
or just developed because they’re in a convenient location for the team.
But these are different. The Korean National Football Centre will be
home to over a dozen sport field typologies, natural running tracks and an indoor gymnasium.
They'll all be linked to medical and treatment centres
for the players. But they’re not just designed to optimise physical health.
There’s an emphasis on natural materials, as we said.
And green space and vegetation will be incorporated throughout
to integrate the centre with the surrounding farmland and hills.
But it’s not all greenery and timber. This is South Korea we’re talking about,
one of the most technologically advanced countries on earth.
So, of course its newest stadium will be fitted out with cutting edge tech. The facilities
will integrate discrete smart tracking features throughout the built environment.
Nowadays, there is a lot of technology, which is a lot of data driven things. I mean,
the players are monitored in all its aspects. Data are gathered about their health,
about the physiology. When they are training, there are camera systems that can follow
and analyse the game. So all these things are very important for the trainers nowadays
to decide what system to play, what player to put in the team, etc.
But technology isn’t just a part of the design, it’s been crucial to the design process itself.
Yes, those are designers viewing their concepts in virtual reality.
UNStudio used a software called SpaceForm to build a virtual 3D
model of the Korean National Football Centre.
As you can imagine, creating a digital model of an entire football complex
takes a lot of rendering power. That’s where Unreal Engine by Epic Games comes in.
That's right, the same software that powers your favourite video games, like Fortnite, is also behind next
level architectural renders like this one, thanks to its ability to handle such large data sets.
Epic Games supported the development of SpaceForm with an Epic MegaGrant just over a year ago,
which helped build the proof of concept.
Now, the Korea Football Association is able to collaborate with UNStudio
and present their designs to the public virtually.
Whether they’re in Amsterdam, New York or Seoul, stakeholders are able to tour the
complex and see the design from every angle, from a VR headset, desktop or mobile device.
The most interesting is that you can work with physical
built models in architecture because you do that a lot. But then you cannot really go
into the model. And that is what is the most advantage of the SpaceForm platform is that you
can really go into the model, you can look around, you can step down, you can walk on the field,
you can see other people moving, that’s another thing.
SpaceForm lets teams upload their designs from Rhino 3D,
Revit or Sketchup and build a real-time, immersive 3D presentation.
Things that just aren’t possible on paper, like getting a feel for how the
sunlight will flow through the structure of a stadium, suddenly become possible.
That makes international collaboration and decision making a whole lot easier,
especially when changing travel restrictions and
guidance make it close to impossible for everyone to meet together on site.
It is fascinating that these design approaches give you also a more human centric
approach to the way how you experience the space as a person and in the space itself.
UNStudio has taken the spirit of digital innovation and baked it
into its design process, from concept right through to the final product.
But the most important component of all is the human element – these stadiums are designed to
foster an environment that invites everybody to experience the sport of football in all its glory.
South Korea’s legacy of football is far from over. And the new
National Football Centre shows just how serious the country is about its future.
It’s not just a space for potential world championships, it’s a commitment
to holistic wellbeing for athletes, and an investment in the future of football.
This video was made possible by Epic Games. You can find out more about
how they’re taking digital collaboration to the next level at the link below.
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