Beijing National Stadium

architecture · olympics · beijing

Called the Bird's Nest. The stadium got its nickname because its twisty steel frame looks like a giant bird's nest woven together. From far away, you can really see why people call it that.

Absolutely enormous. The stadium covers an area of 204,000 square meters, which is roughly the size of 28 football fields. It can hold 80,000 people at once, making it one of the world's biggest stadiums.

Tricky to build. Construction started in March 2004 and took over four years to complete by June 2008. Engineers had to figure out how to make those wild curved steel beams support all that weight without it looking messy.

Home of the 2008 Olympics. The Beijing National Stadium was built specially to host the Summer Olympic Games in 2008. Thousands of athletes from all around the world competed there in front of cheering crowds.