VMDO Architects

VMDO Architects formed the stadium as a figural space within a park-like setting. The entrance to the athletic park is on axis with the University's 1960's basketball arena, and a pedestrian path winds around the track and field stadium and connects the soccer and baseball stadiums.

The lacrosse and soccer stadium responds to the historical context of the University's classical architecture with brick walls and white columns, while the exposed steel structure, sculptural elevator tower and state-of-the-art turf field and locker room meet the requirements of a modern sporting arena.

The stadium also exists as an element in the landscape. An ellipse of white columns rhythmically measures the rising and falling earth of two axial grass slopes. The berms created by the rolling land provide additional spectator seating and mediate the geometries of the game field and the adjacent practice field and road. Their soft grass surfaces harden to concrete stairs just as the entry path meets the ellipse, marking the stadium's entrance and its connection to the athletic complex.

From outside the stadium, the columns mark the edge of a built place within a natural landscape. Their spacing allows a dialogue between the composed, level playing field and the undulating topography of the Virginia landscape.

Within the stadium, the columns literally continue the structure of the grandstand so that spectators and players are enclosed in a great outdoor room, a counterpart to the University's original outdoor room­—the Lawn of Jefferson's Academic Village.

Touted by Soccer America magazine in 1992 as being the ‘Taj Mahal of American Soccer,’ Klöckner Stadium equipped UVa’s soccer team to subsequently win the 1992, 1993, and 1994 NCAA Championships.