Hamar Olympic Amphitheatre - Facilities

Facilities

The twin areas are located at Storhamar, a residential area west of the town center of Hamar. Similar to Vikingskipet, the venue has two official names, Hamar Olympic Amphitheatre and Nordlyshallen. The former cannot be used commercially by non-Olympic events, such as in merchandise. The venue is owned by the municipally owned entity called Hamar Olympiske Anlegg, which also owns and operates Vikingskipet. The operating deficits are covered by a post-Olympic capital fund, which in the case of the two Hamar venues was NOK 60 million. Only the interest of these funds is used to operate the facilities, unlike Lillehammer and Gjøvik which also derive fundings from their base capital. Owing to the fund, Hamar Municipality does not need to give municipal grants to operate the facilities.

Hamar Olympic Amphitheatre is oval and has wood as the main construction material, both for the interior and the exterior. Overall it is 95 meters (312 ft) long, 75 meters (246 ft) wide and 22 meters (72 ft) tall. Architect Ola Mowè of HRTB chose the shape to connect various spacial designs and types of buildings in the neighborhood. The dark color was chosen to counteract the otherwise lively array of colors in the surroundings. The roof was built using laminated wood lattice girders. The longest beam span is 70 meters (230 ft). The exterior walls are clad with boards, panels and decorative molding. The interior wall are covered with pine panel.

The surface area of the building is 11,000 square meters (120,000 sq ft), of which 7,000 square meters (75,000 sq ft) is on the ground floor. When used for ice hockey, the venue has an official spectator capacity for 6,091. When used fot handball the capacity is 6,480. Storhamar Ishall has standing-only capacity for 1,500 spectators. During the Olympics, the main hall had 330 VIP seats, 60 seats for commentators and 200 press seats. The main rink has an eight-sided, 75-square-meter (810 sq ft) media cube.