Inside the Workshop: 3D Printing the Emirates Stadium

The first stadium tribute we ever tried to print was the Emirates. It is, in our opinion, the most architecturally interesting stadium in world football — the asymmetric roof, the four anchor masts, the way the cantilever curves out over the North Bank like it's trying to shield the crowd from the sky.

We got it wrong the first time. The roof was too flat. The masts were too thin. The whole thing looked like a toy. It took us nine months to get the roof right, and we threw out four prototype print runs along the way.

Here is the process that finally worked.

Step 1: The Reference

We start with satellite imagery and architectural drawings, cross-referenced with crowd photos from every section of the ground. The Emirates is well-documented — the architects released detailed elevations when it opened in 2006 — but no single source has every detail.

The roof is the hardest part. From the outside, it looks like a smooth wave. From the inside, it has a structural rib every 7.5 metres. Both views are correct, depending on where you're standing.

Step 2: The Mesh

We model the stadium in Blender, starting with the pitch (a perfect rectangle) and working outward. The roof comes last because everything else has to support its weight — visually, not structurally.

For the Emirates, we ended up with 2.4 million polygons before decimation. The print file we ship is 80,000 polygons, optimized for a 0.16 mm layer height on a Bambu X1 Carbon.

Step 3: The Print

A single Emirates tribute takes 38 hours to print in PLA, plus another 6 hours for the roof sub-assembly. We print it in seven parts:

1. The main bowl
2. The roof (4 sub-panels)
3. The four anchor masts
4. The base plate

Then we sand, prime, and paint. The red seats are airbrushed in three coats. The pitch gets a 0.5 mm flock finish so it looks like grass, not plastic.

Step 4: The Quality Check

Every tribute gets photographed from six angles before it ships. If the roof seam is visible, if the masts are off-axis by even 0.5 mm, if a single red seat is over-painted — it goes back to rework.

We reject about 8% of prints at the quality stage. We would rather delay an order by a week than ship a tribute that doesn't honor the ground.

Why It Matters

A stadium tribute is not a model. It is a piece of a place. When a Gooner puts the Emirates on their shelf, they are not decorating — they are keeping a piece of home where they can see it every day. That deserves the work.

"I cried when I opened the box. I am not embarrassed about that." — a customer in Toronto.

What Is Next

The Liverpool Anfield tribute ships in late June 2026. The Camp Nou (post-renovation) tribute is in design review and will ship in Q3 2026. Both are available to preorder now with a 20% launch discount.

If your club's home ground isn't on the list, tell us. We read every email and prioritize new tributes by the volume of requests we get.