Accor Arena, Paris
Paris’ AccorHotels Arena completed an extensive refurbishment and redevelopment programme in 2015. The largest indoor entertainment Arena in Paris (maximum capacity circa 20,300) has had various guises in its history; originally opened in 1984 as the “Palais omnisports de Paris-Bercy”, rebranded as the Bercy Arena in 2014 and now the AccorHotels Arena.
As one the primary sports, music & entertainment venues in Paris, operator AEG (in partnership with the owner, City of Paris) were keen to ensure the refurbishment delivered the optimum acoustic environment to attract the world’s best sports & music events. As such, they enlisted the services of UK’s Vanguardia to provide consultancy to review the architectural and acoustic design at the construction stage of the project.
CLIENT: AEG
COMPLETION DATE: 2015
CAPACITY: 20,300
PROJECT COST: £60M
The original refurbishment concept was developed by DVVD Architects in conjunction with Acoustic engineers from Peutz Group.
Given their extensive experience of large scale venue acoustics, and specifically venue optimisation for amplified music concerts, Vanguardia were appointed by AEG to work with the Contractor and Peutz to arrive at an optimum acoustic solution.
Prior to refurbishment, the Arena featured ageing surface finishes, notably an extensive quantity of hard tiled surfaces close to the audience. Peutz took initial acoustic measurements before work started on site, measuring a reverberation time of 2.8 seconds at mid frequencies rising to 4 seconds at low frequencies.
Vanguardia introduced additional acoustic absorption to the box fronts, and optimised the design of low frequency absorption in the upper wall/roof. Large scale bass-traps were also proposed.
Since its reopening, the arena has played host to a number of sell-out concerts by international artists including Ed Sheeran, Iron Maiden and David Guetta.