New adidas Meet & Eat flagship

In the 2014 summer, the world famous sports brand adidas announced an international competition for the design of adidas Meet & Eat – a public conference center with employee restaurant and showroom, located at the headquarters of the adidas Group, called World of Sports, in the South German city Herzogenaurach. The winning team is Danish architects COBE in collaboration with German COBE Berlin, Knippers Helbig and Transsolar; the team has created a distinctive landmark that is flexible, user-friendly and functional. According to Dan Stubbergaard, Founder and Creative Director at COBE:  “The adidas brand has always been known for technique and functionality, so we have desig¬ned a building that reflects and encapsulates these values. Adidas Meet & Eat will house many functions, both internal and public, therefore we have created an open, green and welcoming building containing multiple functions and flows under one single roof. The iconic roof covers the spaces like a carpet connecting them all, creating a building flooded with light”. The 11.000 m2 rhombus-shaped building has a strong relation to the surroundings in the adidas campus area; open to all sides with windows from floor to ceiling, it creates a strong connection between inside and outside. Nature is invited in through small winter gardens, where employees and visitors can enjoy their lunch or use the gardens as alternative meeting facilities. For hot summer days, it is possible to open most of the facade. The international competition was settled in November 2014. Besides the winning team, 29 other teams participated in the competition, such as prominent international architects as German Sauerbruch Hutton, American REX and English Zaha Hadid Architects. As a part of the completion of the project, COBE is collaborating with the German architects CL Map. The project is expected to be completed at the end of 2018.