This panorama is on offer as an art print at OhMyPrints
History of the Zentralstadion
As early as the 1930s, plans were made for a 100,000-seat sports stadium at the Elster basin. However, the stadium was not built until after the Second World War in 1954-56, when a huge concrete bowl was erected on an earth wall using 1/3 of the war rubble from the city of Leipzig. At that time, the stadium’s perimeter mainly had standing room, and the main and entrance building shown in the panorama was built in the modern style on its east side. The green stadium wall can still be seen to the right and left of the building. The architect of the Zentralstadion was Karl Souradny. The main building was constructed as a 6-storey plaster construction with short side wings and sandstone cladding. Even today, the old Zentralstadion holds the German spectator record in football with a league match in September 1956 and 100,000 spectators, which earned the stadium the nickname Stadium of the Hundred Thousand (an international match against Czechoslovakia was later even attended by 110,000 people). It was considered a prestige project of the GDR.
Neues Zentralstadion | RB Arena
An East German venue was planned for the 2006 World Cup in Germany, and the city of Leipzig decided to demolish the Zentralstadion in favour of a new building. This was realised under the leadership of the architects Wirth+Wirth (Leipzig and Basel) and co-planning by Glöckner Architekten (Leipzig and Nuremberg) and Körber, Barton, Fahle (Freiburg). The new arena was built as a new structure within the wall of the old Zentralstadion. Spectators reach the arena via several access bridges from the old rampart. The arena was given a curved four-part roof made of trapezoidal steel profiles, each consisting of two opposing grandstand roofs (visible in the background) and the two curved side roofs. Since 2010, the football club RB Leipzig has played in the stadium and, at the same time, it was renamed Red Bull Arena. With 47,000 spectator seats, it is now the second largest stadium in eastern Germany.
As part of the Leipzig Sports Forum, the stadium is located between the Elsterbecken and Waldstraßenviertel districts and is only about 1,400 metres from Leipzig city centre.
