The Intuit Dome – a new home for an iconic LA team.

Located on, and visible from, the flight path to nearby LAX Airport, and south of the recently completed SoFi stadium, this new 18,000-seat basketball stadium for the LA Clippers marked the first time the NBA team had its own dedicated arena. This ambitious project described by owner Steve Ballmer as a ‘basketball palazzo’ features a dynamic, reflective façade, like the scales of an Armadillo.

We worked with the project team, led by AECOM’s LA Office, to illustrate a variety of design development options to help the client choose the right finishes for this prominent scheme. A series of façade options illustrated the different effects of using ETFE, metal or PTFE for the cladding, and showed a variety of colours for the support structure, which we showcased by setting it against the beautiful pink sunsets of LA.

We collaborated with the LA Clippers media team to produce a promo video for the big launch reveal in July 2019, designed to engage fans by showing the stadium on game night. Three years later we completed new marketing images to reflect the final designs, landscaping and public realm. Additional images supported the development of the brand through sponsorship opportunities to show how the building might look bearing the name of potential sponsors. A subsequent 23-year naming rights deal was announced with software giants Intuit.

The stadium also represented an opportunity to create wider community impact with a previously run-down external area transformed into a fanzone, with giant screens, cafés and food stalls. Our interior images feature 3D scans of people wearing LA Clippers jerseys, which were then animated for film content.

Given its flight path location, we were unable to use any drone footage for the aerial views, instead combining 3d rendered views with parallax shifting matte-paintings to create the same effect and showcase the dramatic visual impact the dome will make on the LA skyline.

Project Collaborators:

LA Clippers Media Team