The Olympic Stadium in Montreal, erected for the 1976 summer games, will be reroofed and re-engineered by global architecture firm GMP.
The 55,000-seat venue’s structure comprises ring-shaped concrete cantilever beams with a central inclined tower from which the roof is suspended. The original design included a retractable membrane roof, which was soon replaced by a fixed membrane roof in the late 1980s. Then, in 1999, a nonretractable roof of polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE)-covered fibreglass resting on a steel cable structure was retrofitted. By 2018, inspectors had repaired thousands of perforations in the roof materials.
The current stadium design focuses on the stadium bowl’s natural lighting. The suspended roof structure follows the curves of the sculptural concrete ribs and is set off from the historic building by glazing all the way around. The upper covering is opaque, while the roof is fitted with a translucent membrane on the underside.
