serie architects: BMW olympic pavilion, london

‘BMW pavilion’ at london olympic park by serie architects images courtesy of serie architects/freud/BMW

london-based serie architects has sent us images of their winning design for the new BMW pavilion to be situated within the london 2012 olympic park. the selected proposal follows a competition which involved six rchitecture firms, but BMW chose serie’s project based on its cutting-edge design that is set to represent a significant architectural addition to the olympic park, while also reflecting the german automotive’s commitment to sustainability. ‘as a major investor, manufacturer and employer in the UK, BMW group is deeply proud to be an official partner for britain’s first olympic & paralympic games since 1948. this commitment to the UK is also reflected in our choice of a home-grown architecture practice to design our pavilion and we’re delighted that serie’s final design reflects our commitment to sustainable thinking in such an innovative and eye-catching manner. we believe it provides a truly worthy addition to the olympic park.’ – tim abbot, managing director, BMW group UK.

the two-storey superstructure will be constructed from steel with high recycled content with use of carbon-intensive materials such as concrete, minimized. covering a floor space of 800m2, the volume is to be situated between the olympic stadium and aquatics centre. built on an elevated site above the waterworks river, the pavilion will take advantage of its location. through a water curtain feature, the building will utilize river water as a means of cooling the structure before returning the filtered resource to the flowing body of water below. the top floor will house a number of individual standalone pavilions that will be used to highlight BMW’s latest vehicle innovations. the lower floor will house a range of interactive visitor exhibitions, articulating BMW’s vision for sustainable mobility and support for team GB and paralympicsGB athletes through the BMW london 2012 performance team programme.

in total, nine pavilions will be clustered together to form the super structure which will exhibit a water curtain feature

an expected 8,000 visitors are expected to visit the pavilion each day during the olympic and paralympic games. as the official automotive partner to the london 2012 olympic games, and a tier one sponsor, the BMW group will provide a fleet of approximately 4,000 vehicles that will transport athletes and officials during the games. this convoy will combine sustainable technologies including electric, hybrid and low-emissions diesel technologies to meet LOCOG’s challenging emissions target of 120g/km CO2 across the fleet. ‘the design takes the idea of the pavilion in the park – the victorian bandstand – but instead of one pavilion we envision nine pavilions clustered together to form a family.’ – christopher lee, serie, co-founder and principal architect

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