Why are Barcelona playing at Estadi Olímpic Lluís Companys? When will Camp Nou reopen?

One of the most hotly-anticipated games of the 2023/24 Champions League kicks off in the the Catalan capital on Tuesday. Barcelona host Paris Saint-Germain in the second leg of their quarter-final but the game will not be played at their famous Camp Nou stadium.

Instead the game will take place at Barca’s temporary digs, Estadi Olímpic Lluís Companys in the Montjuic area of the city. The venue was first used for the 1992 Olympic Games, hosted in Barcelona, and has fulfilled many roles in the city in the subsequent three decades.

Barca will play in Montjuic for the rest of this season and are expected to make a Spotify Camp Nou return in November of 2024 (29 November being cited as the return date) albeit with only 50% of the new stadium set to be operative. The club have earmarked 2026 as the year when all renovation work will have completed.

The club had been toying with a stadium overhaul for a number of years with the new Camp Nou forming part of the Espai Barça that will see a major transformation in the Les Corts stadium and Estadi Johan Cruyff which will look to generate revenue for the club 365 days of the year. FC Barcelona’s financial issues have been well documented and this development, the club hopes, will help to bolster revenue and make one of the world’s most illustrious sporting institutions even more successful. Commercially, at least.

What will the new Camp Nou capacity be?

The historic Camp Nou stadium redevelopment forms part of the $1.5 billion renovation project and when completed, will see an increase in the capacity of the stadium from 99,354 seats to 105,000.

The new Spotify Camp Nou stadium is being designed by Japanese company Nikken Sekkei, who defeated 8 other finalist candidates to win the $420 million bid to renovate Barcelona’s iconic Camp Nou stadium from 1957. Nikken Sekkei will collaborate with local architects Pascual i Ausió Arquitectes.