Blues may be leaving St. Andrew’s in five years, but they plan to transfer the spirit of the stadium with them.
In 2030, Tom Wagner and Knighthead hope the £1.2 billion Powerhouse will open.
It will be hard to say goodbye to Blues home ground since 1906, a place where memories – good and bad – have been made.
St. Andrew’s has an energising and galvanising feel about it on the big occasions, which can be a significant factor in motivating and helping the team, not least when it’s a raucous and intimidatory full house.
And whilst it’s shiny, new and state of the art, Blues want The Powerhouse to be an arena where that kind of atmosphere can be replicated.
The stands at the new ground will rake down into the bowl, the home ‘walls’ at either being at the steepest angle regulations allow.
Similarly, Blues plan to ensure the pitch is as close to the perimeter of the stands as possible.
With acoustic enhancers in the roof, to keep the noise contained and ‘bounce’ it towards the pitch, a cacophony of sound could be created.
And imagine a big fixture with the retractable roof closed . . .
Steven Knight is part of the team tasked with the job of the stadium design and build.
The renowned creator and writer of Peaky Blinders knows all about what St. Andrew’s is like, having gone to his first Blues game there in 1966.
A regular and season ticket holder over the years, Knight advised on how The Powerhouse should pay homage to the club and city’s past – hence the eye-catching main feature of the 12 brick chimneys.
On the day the stadium was revealed at his Digbeth Loc. Studios, the description ‘a sporting coliseum’ was used. That was not by accident.
when I asked Knight after the design unveiling about the deliberate ploy to make The Powerhouse a place where the St. Andrew’s atmosphere could devolve, he was enthused.
“And it’s for everybody’s benefit,” he said.
“And I think when you do get that atmosphere, they’re the nights you remember.
“What I always think about football is you can go to the theatre or cinema and it could be the greatest play or the greatest film.
“Very rarely if ever – probably never – are you suddenly going to jump up in your seat and pump the air and hug a complete stranger, because what you just saw was so amazing.
“Football, you do that. Sport, you do that. So this has got to be an environment where those heightened, intense emotions are released.”
The chimneys have triggered plenty of debate. Knight is unapologetic about them. The brief was that the stadium should be unique and stand out.
“That’s the idea. When you see it and when you see the skyline, and I think anything that affects the skyline is important, and when you see the skyline and you see that if you’re in Buenos Aires, you’re in Barcelona, you’re in New York, you’ll go ‘Birmingham’.”
And it’s not just football where the acoustics come into play. Blues are determined to make The Powerhouse a must-stop concert destination for the biggest artists and groups around.
Said Knight: “It was funny talking to the architects when they said ‘this is the first brief we’ve ever had with the word intimidate in it’.
“But the other thing about the acoustics is that it’s going to be designed in such a way that never again will the biggest music artists in the world come to Britain and not come to Birmingham, because it’s going to be the place they want to come.”
Putting Birmingham on the world map as well as the club, via The Powerhouse and Sports Quarter on the 135-acre site, is Knighthead’s avowed intention.
And, as far as Knight is concerned, Wagner, Tom Brady et al are the real deal.
“It’s so big (stadium and Sports Quarter project) and we’re backed by people with such confidence and belief.
“So we’ve got to match it, not just the financial investment, but time investment, emotional investment, as Blues fans, as people of Birmingham we’ve got to understand that.
“I’m still not sure it’s real, so I might be dreaming. But no, the thing is that every single aspect of this is not pie in the sky. None of it.
“It’s all costed, it’s all measured, and we’re dealing with people doing projects that are three times bigger than this in other parts of the world.
“So this is not like anybody going out on a limb. This is what they do and it just happens to be that they’re doing it with us.”
Knighthead have bought into Birmingham big time.
“Absolutely,” said Knight. “There are lots of parallels between us and Boston, between us and places like Philadelphia and Pittsburgh and all of that, industrial places, they’re not so different to us.
“I just think smart people have spotted an opportunity.”
