The Barcelona stadium Nou Camp will be redesigned by Norman Foster

Barcelona - Renowned British architect Norman Foster will take care of the new look of Barcelona's football stadium Nou Camp. His project won the competition of the Catalan giant, which has been at home in Nou Camp for fifty years. Currently the largest football stadium in Europe will have 15,000 more seats after reconstruction, allowing at least 114,000 spectators in the future.
Barcelona's club is celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of the completion of its stadium this year, and on this occasion, it has decided to significantly modernize its football sanctuary. Several world-renowned architectural firms competed for the prestigious contract. Among the ten finalists alongside the winner were the Swiss duo Herzog & de Meuron, the authors of the football arena in Munich, and the Japanese office Sanaa.
Details of the winning proposal will be disclosed by FC Barcelona's management on Saturday. However, fans likely have nothing to fear, as Foster's team has experience with designs for sports facilities. For example, his reconstruction of London's Wembley has received acclaim.
The budget is currently estimated at 250 million euros (almost seven billion crowns), and the reconstruction is expected to be completed in 2011. Matches will still take place at the stadium during the construction works.
Nou Camp was officially opened on September 24, 1957, and has since undergone several reconstructions. The last significant upgrades took place in 1994.
The stadium hosted the FIFA World Cup in 1982 and was also the venue for some events of the Barcelona Olympics ten years later. In addition to athletes, notable performers like Michael Jackson and the Irish band U2 have performed at Nou Camp, and the famous "Three Tenors" - José Carreras, Plácido Domingo, and the recently deceased Luciano Pavarotti - also held concerts there. It was at this stadium that Pope John Paul II held a mass during his visit to Spain.
The 72-year-old Pritzker Prize winner Lord Norman Foster and his firm build around the world. Among his most famous works are the reconstruction of the Berlin Reichstag building, the design of the well-known London skyscraper housing Swiss Re, and the gigantic bridge crossing the valley in Millau, France.

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> Competition: FC Barcelona Stadium [26.3.2007]