Zaha Hadid beat an impressive list of finalists to win the Japan National Stadium competition including: second place Cox Architecture, and third place SANAA. Other finalists include Toyo Ito and Populous. Tadao Ando was one of the judges with the Japan Sports Council.
The stadium will seat 80,000 and will have multiple configurations including football and athletics. Those two are difficult to satisfactorily accommodate as the football crowd feels too far away from the action.
The stadium is scheduled for completion in 2018, in time to host the 2019 Rugby World Cup. If Japan is successful in its bid, it will also host the 2020 Olympics.
