We are an independent firm of designers, planners, engineers, consultants and technical specialists offering a broad range of professional services. Through our work, we make a positive difference in the world. We shape a better world.
Founded in 1946 with an initial focus on structural engineering, Arup first came to the world’s attention with the structural design of the Sydney Opera House, followed by its work on the Centre Pompidou in Paris. Arup has since grown into a truly multidisciplinary organisation. Most recently, its work for the 2008 Olympics in Beijing has reaffirmed its reputation for delivering innovative and sustainable designs that reinvent the built environment.
Arup brings together broad-minded individuals from a wide range of disciplines and encourages them to look beyond the constraints of their own specialisms.
This unconventional approach to design springs in part from Arup’s ownership structure. The firm is owned in trust on behalf of its staff. The result is an independence of spirit that is reflected in the firm’s work, and in its dedicated pursuit of technical excellence.
Markets
Sport
To inspire sport’s best, Arup helps to create high-performance venues. The greatest sports buildings come out of creative partnerships. Arup works with leading architects and the organisers of sporting events worldwide to create venues that perform better.
Our combined design, technical and commercial expertise helps clients to realise their highest aspirations, whether in game-changing visitor experiences or legacy sports facilities.
Reshaping sports venues
In sporting landmarks such as Beijing’s National Aquatics Center (Water Cube) and National Stadium (Bird’s Nest), Munich’s Allianz Arena and Melbourne’s AAMI Park, Arup’s structural design skills have helped reinvent the form of sports venues.
Arup is also helping to deliver the technology that is transforming sports events. We work with developers, clubs and venue operators to plan, build and run smarter sports projects and rich visitor experiences for events, venues, sports parks or even entire sport cities.
We do this with integrated specialist services in IT and communications, lighting, multimedia and broadcasting systems, security, transport and wayfinding, venue management, logistics and operational readiness.
Arup is also equipped to assist with sport’s climatic and environmental challenges, having conducted extensive research into the design of technically complex, comfortable and sustainable stadia. Never content with theory alone, we showed how a venue could be sustainably cooled and zero-carbon in practice with our 2022 FIFA World Cup Qatar Showcase, a 500-seat demonstration stadium.
Hotels and leisure
We bring focus to people, place and performance in hotel developments worldwide.
For guests, a hotel offers an experience as well as a place to rest. Equally, a hotel is a workplace, and often a stimulus to local prosperity. Where hotels meet leisure, retail and luxury living, they also become social and entertainment hubs.
In all roles, a hotel is a business – one that must engage with its guests and staff, as well as its community and environment, in order to thrive. At Arup, we support hotel and leisure clients by creating distinctive, responsive developments that serve high-performing and resilient businesses.
We provide a full design service, from concept to operation. Our building designers and consultants work with developers and operators around the globe – on projects that typically equate to around 25,000 rooms at any one time, and range from an eco-lodge in South Africa to the Venetian Macau, Asia’s largest single-structure hotel plus resort.
