BIG & HNTB create new home for Oakland Athletics

Tenderstream member Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) and HNTB have unveiled the design for a ballpark in Las Vegas, which will be home to major league baseball team Oakland Athletics (the A's). BIG will lead the master planning, with HNTB collaborating and serving as the architect of record. "The collaboration between BIG’s creativity and HNTB’s technical expertise allows for a truly innovative and bold design while ensuring an unmatched fan experience,” says Athletics managing partner and owner John Fisher. “We hope to add to the dynamic atmosphere and liveliness of the Las Vegas Strip, creating a welcoming environment for all of Southern Nevada.”

Shaped by its location on the Las Vegas Strip, the 33,000-person capacity ballpark provides an outdoor feel allowing for views of the city’s skyline, with the tiered design split over upper and lower seating bowls to bring fans closer to the action than traditional ballparks, while providing clear sight lines from every seat. The outfield features the world’s largest cable-net glass window, facing the corner of Tropicana and Las Vegas Boulevards. The current designs also include an 18,000 sq ft video display wall, which would make it the largest screen in major league baseball.

The roof's five overlapping layers, whose design is inspired by traditional baseball pennants, open to the north to allow for natural light and views up the Strip, while also limiting direct sunlight and heat from the south. Bjarke Ingels, founder and creative Director of BIG, states: “The resultant architecture is like a spherical armadillo - shaped by the local climate - while opening and inviting the life of the Strip to enter and explore. In the city of spectacle, the A’s ‘armadillo’ is designed for passive shading and natural light - the architectural response to the Nevada climate generating a new kind of vernacular icon in Vegas.”

The A’s will continue to collaborate with local partners and navigate approval processes, making refinements to the design over the next year, with the ballpark set to open for the 2028 season.

Lucy Nordberg
Tenderstream Head of Research

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