Performance with Purpose: Designing for Sports & Entertainment

It seems that news of expansion teams, “first of their kind” facilities, and the ever-changing world of collegiate athletics continue to find their way into our regular news cycles.

Sports and entertainment are entering a new era, requiring designers to ride the cutting-edge of what it means to design spaces for athletes and fans alike. In order to best-serve our projects and design teams, Holmes leans into a highly-collaborative approach to our sports and entertainment projects. Holmes has a unique perspective on the key trends and challenges in sports facility design.

We’re engineers who speak fluent sports design. We are invested in optimizing our impact on the environment and society. We do what it takes to meet tight schedules—we know you can’t shift seasons. We value the journey and put in the extra reps to prepare us for game time.

Want to connect?

Let’s Talk Sports

Women’s Sports & Practice Facilities

We’re witnessing a pivotal moment in women’s sports, where design is emerging as a critical answer to the question of what it takes for female athletes to reach peak performance. The recent purpose-built spaces, including the WNBA Seattle Storm Center for Basketball Performance, have started to tackle this question as research and learnings about designing for women athletes are being uncovered in real-time. The challenge lies in building flexibility into these designs, creating spaces that can adapt to the evolving landscape of women’s sports while addressing current demands for these athletes, including increased safety, privacy and holistic health support.

The design considerations for women’s sports facilities extend far beyond simply scaling down men’s facilities, we refuse to “pink it and shrink it”. Designers must navigate the delicate balance between creating spaces that support athletes’ growing need for brand partnerships and fan engagement while simultaneously ensuring privacy, safety, and security. This includes thoughtful planning for media areas, fan interaction zones, and secure private spaces that allow athletes to control their public exposure. Until women’s sports achieve revenue parity with men’s sports, design teams must embrace a scrappy, innovative approach that maximizes impact within tighter budgets, proving that thoughtful design can be both cost-effective and transformative.

Where does sustainability come into play?

Arenas and stadiums are typically designed to at least a 50-year lifespan, though they’re typically replaced in nearly half that time. For franchises to compete with shifting demographics, technological advances and changing fan experiences while maintaining financial viability, owners are faced with the decision to either implement major renovations to their facilities or start fresh from the ground up. As we continue to push the boundaries with arena/stadium design, it also begs the question of environmental impact of these structures.

Holmes had the opportunity to collaborate with Oak View Group and the Boston Red Sox on a sustainability study of historic Fenway Park. This study brought to light the frequency in which the average Major League Baseball team constructs a new stadium, and the embodied carbon impact of building a new stadium from the group-up. As we are thinking about designing for the next generation of arenas, stadiums and entertainment districts we aim to design space that can support teams, fans and communities for the next 100+ years.