Timelapse video of Barcelona’s Nou Camp upgrade plans released

Spanish footballing giants, FC Barcelona, have released a computer generated timelapse video, revealing their plans to upgrade their iconic Nou Camp stadium, whilst increasing capacity to 105,000.

The stadium is home to Barça’s superstars such as arguably the world’s finest Lionel Messi, Brazil’s leading light, Neymar Jnr and former Liverpool striker Luis Suarez – who if he continues the season in his current form will be challenging Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo for the Ballon D’or.

The current capacity stands at just under 100,000, making it the largest stadium in Europe.

Japanese firm Nikken Sekkei and Catalan studio Pascual i Ausio Arquitecte have been chosen as the designers to transform the stadium. The project is expected to cost around £277.5M and will see the current capacity of 99,354 increased to 105,000, with all seats being under cover.

Work on the Nou Camp is due to commence during the 2017/18 season and should be completed at some point in 2020/21 campaign.

When the Nou Camp opened, it had a capacity of 93,053. It was originally envisaged that the stadium would hold a staggering 150,000 before those plans were abandoned. It is said that the signing of Hungarian legend, László Kubala, was the catalyst to the club’s board decision to move to a new stadium to cope with the increased interest in the team. However, the club’s success in winning back-to-back league titles in 1947-48 and 1948-49 was also instrumental in the club’s decision to build a new home.

It is nearly 70 years ago since the inaugural match was played at the stadium – Barcelona taking on Polish team Warsaw. Barcelona ran out 4-2 winners as the club began a new era in its history.

The cost of the stadium was initially expected to come in at 66,620,000 pesetas, with construction taking around 18 months to complete. However, the cost spiralled to a staggering 288 million pesetas – forcing the Catalan club to look to numerous mortgage obligations to cover the cost of construction and resulting in Barça coping with huge levels debts for a number of years.

The stadium’s capacity was increased in 1982 by 22,150 with the creation of a third tier of seating. This increased capacity to 115,000.

1994 sae more work undertaken to allow the pitch to be lowered by 2.5 metres to expand the lower seating areas. The standing sections of the ground located behind the goals were converted to seating leaving the Nou Camp’s capacity at its present figure of 99,000.

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