Ljudski vrt

The construction of the main stand in 1961.

The area now known as Ljudski vrt was originally located outside of Maribor's city walls and served as a cemetery for centuries.[5] Around the year 1358 a small parish church with a cemetery was built and remained there until 1522 when it was abandoned,[5][14] with Turkish incursions being the most likely reason.[15] By 1571 the church was completely in ruins. The site served as a cemetery again between 1783 and 1914 when it was closed by a decision of the Maribor city council.[14] Some of the tombs were allowed to be in use until 1937 when they were transferred to a new site.[14] In 1873, a public park (German: Volksgarten) was planted on the area from which Ljudski vrt received its present-day name.[5] At the beginning of the 20th century, Ljudski vrt area became the recreational centre of the city and records from 1901 show that tennis was already being played there during that time.[16] During World War I, the whole area served as a shooting range for the Austro-Hungarian Army.[17] Similar to other Slovenian towns, football in Maribor boomed after the war with the establishment of new clubs, most notably I. SSK Maribor, which was founded in 1919 by Slovenian youth.[18][19][20] The club was composed exclusively of high school students, which obtained a grass field at the Ljudski vrt area and rearranged it into the first real football pitch.[21] In March 1919, another German club, SV Rapid Marburg, was founded.[21] In January 1920, Rapid signed a contract with the Maribor's city authorities to obtain a football field at the Ljudski vrt area for the next ten years.[21] In the same year, I. SSK Maribor also obtained a football field and other facilities at the area.[19] The pitch was completely renovated and the inaugural football match at the area was played on 9 May 1920, when Rapid played Slovan from Ljubljana and lost 4–2 in front of 1,500 spectators.[21][22] The other clubs that played at the area of present-day stadium were Sportklub Merkur, Deutsche Sportklub, SK Hertha, and SK Rote Elf.[21]

After the invasion of Yugoslavia in 1941, Maribor was annexed by Nazi Germany and the Nazi regime immediately disbanded all Slovene cultural and sports societies.[23] I. SSK Maribor was particularly affected with dozens of arrests and deportations of their members.[23] The club ceased all operations and many of their members joined the resistance movement, resulting in a death of 51 members while fighting the Germans.[23] Those victims were later commemorated with the erection of a statue located on the northwestern corner of the stadium today.[23] By the end of the war, Maribor was among the most destroyed larger towns in Yugoslavia[24][25] and the whole Ljudski vrt area was devastated and without an organization which would renovate and later manage the sporting infrastructure at the site. On 29 January 1949, an initiative led to the establishment of Branik Maribor football club.[26] Two years later, in 1951, they became the flagship of the new sport organization, MŠD Branik (Slovene: Mariborsko športno društvo Branik).[27]

The concrete terraces enclosed the pitch on three sides and were used as a standing area until the 1990s.

The renovation and construction of the sports infrastructure at Ljudski vrt and throughout Maribor was the primary objective of the new sports organization during most of the late 1940s and early 1950s and on 12 July 1952 the Ljudski vrt stadium was opened.[5][11][28] At the time, the main pitch was fully enclosed by banking, surrounding the athletic track, with concrete terraces and seats located on the western side.[28] By 1958 the concrete terraces, in length of 248 meters, were constructed throughout the banking around the pitch and served as the standing area for over 40 years.[28] Milan Černigoj was the main architect of the stadium and in the late 1950s he was joined by Boris Pipan with whom they designed a new main stand on the western side of the pitch.[28] The construction began in May 1960 and was completed in 1962, with the new club offices, dressing rooms and gyms located beneath it.[28] Notable feature of the stand includes 129.8-metre (425 ft 10 in) long and 18.4-metre (60 ft 4 in) high concrete arch that is protected by the Institute for the Protection of Cultural Heritage of Slovenia (Zavod za varstvo kulturne dediščine Slovenije).[29] The primary user of the stadium and the new club offices was to be NK Branik, however, the club was dissolved in 1960 due to a food poisoning affair.[11] After that, the city of Maribor was left without an association football club that would play on a professional level, which was one of the reasons why NK Maribor was established on 12 December 1960.[11] The new club found their home at Ljudski vrt and on 25 June 1961 they played their first match at the stadium, with the then main stand still under construction.[30] After the opening of the main stand in 1962, the stadium's capacity was increased to over 10,000. However, as most of the stadium had only concrete standing terraces it was possible to accommodate as much as 20,000 spectators during the club's important matches.[4] During the 1967–68 season, when Maribor competed in the Yugoslav First League for the first time, the club renovated the dressing rooms, bathrooms and sanitary facilities, which were in poor condition and inadequate for the top division level.[31]

Ljudski vrt was to remain in much the same state for another thirty years with no major developments until the early 1990s and the independence of Slovenia.[17] In 1994, the wooden benches on the main stand were replaced by plastic seats.[17] The main stand also received a small expansion, and the entire stadium received appropriate telecommunication connections.[28] During the same year, on 24 August, the stadium received four floodlight pylons and the first match at night was played between NK Maribor and FC Norma Tallinn as part of the 1994–95 UEFA Cup Winners' Cup, won by Maribor 10–0.[17] The capacity of the stadium was reduced four years later; the concrete stands were abolished and replaced by a seating area as a result of UEFA safety regulations, with the ground's conversion to an all-seater stadium.[17] During the 1999–2000 season, Maribor became the first and to date the only Slovenian club to qualify for the elite UEFA Champions League.[17][32] As a result, the stadium received its first major redevelopment since 1962 with the renovation of the main stand's VIP area, dressing rooms and club offices.[17] The terraces ring opposite of the main stand was enlarged by 2,000 seats, bringing the total spectator capacity to 10,030.[28][33] In 2000, the irrigation system was installed to water the pitch,[33] alongside with a new training field with artificial turf.[28]

East stand of the stadium in 2015

NK Maribor results in domestic and international competitions during the 1990s were the reason for political and sports officials in the city to start considering a new stadium. In 1996, the OFIS Architects "Project Ring" was selected with a plan to fully redevelop and modernise the stadium.[5] The project included the refurbishment of the main stand and the surrounding area, removal of the athletic track and the concrete terraces on the northern, southern and eastern side of the pitch and their replacement with the brand new covered stands. In addition, the project also included new club offices, gym's, dressing rooms and commercial premises such as shops and bars located beneath the new stands. However, it would take nearly a decade for the project to become a reality when in 2006 the City of Maribor and MŠD Branik, with the help of the Government of Slovenia and the European Union, finally amassed enough funds to start the first stage of the project.[5]

The first stage of improvements, worth about €10 million, saw the removal of the athletic track and the demolition of the existing uncovered stands that surrounded the pitch from the north, east and south. Those stands were replaced by new covered stands, built only a couple of metres from the pitch.[5] Construction began in August 2006 and was finished by May 2008.[5] One of the improvements included the replacement of the turf, which also included the installation of the underground heating system. During the reconstruction, Maribor played a few matches at the Ptuj City Stadium in Ptuj, about 30 kilometres from the city of Maribor.[5] In addition, this was the first time that Maribor had played home matches outside of Ljudski vrt since the opening of the main stand in 1961.[5] The new stands, which increased the stadium capacity by over 2,000 seats, were opened on 10 May 2008 during a league match against Nafta Lendava. The match was played in front of a sold-out crowd of 12,435 spectators and Maribor won 3–1. The second stage of the project started in 2010 and saw the completion of the premises under the eastern and southern stands. It included new club offices, dressing rooms and two gyms.[34] In addition, the total capacity of the stadium was brought to its present 12,702 seats.

Artist's rendering of the new west stand

In 2014, the stadium barely passed UEFA stadium regulations for the international competitions due to insufficient condition of the west stand.[35] In August 2015, the first redevelopment plans for the new west stand were announced.[36] Three years later, in August 2018, NK Maribor and the City Municipality of Maribor presented a complete documentation of the proposed west stand redevelopment. The new stand was designed by OFIS Architects and would have a capacity of 3,265 seats at the cost of €6.9 million, with the expected completion in September 2019.[37] However, the redevelopment was later postponed to 2020 due to miscalculations of the project cost, which increased to €8 million.[38]

Ljudski vrt has hosted a total of 23 international matches of the Slovenia national team.[39] The first was a friendly match against Cyprus on 27 April 1994, which Slovenia won 3–0.[40] The first competitive game was played on 7 September 1994 in the UEFA Euro 1996 qualifiers, when Slovenia hosted Italy in a match ending in a 1–1 draw.[41] On 18 November 2009, the ground hosted a 2010 FIFA World Cup play-off against Russia, in which Slovenia won 1–0 in front of 12,510 spectators and therefore qualified for the FIFA World Cup for the second time in the country's history.[42][43] Most recently, on 17 November 2015, Slovenia drew 1–1 with Ukraine in the UEFA Euro 2016 qualifying play-offs.[44] Games involving the Slovenian under-21 team have also been played at the stadium.[45][46]

In 2012, the stadium was among the venues which hosted the 2012 UEFA European Under-17 Championship.[47] Ljudski vrt is also set to host four matches at the 2021 UEFA European Under-21 Championship.[48]

Aside from sporting uses, the stadium has been occasionally used as a music venue for concerts and other cultural performances.[49] One of the first musical events on the renovated stadium was the Greek Zorba musical in June 2008, which had an attendance of around 6,000 people.[50] Ljudski vrt was also a venue for an annual concert Piše se leto, organised by the newspaper Večer.[51] In September 2009, Ljudski vrt hosted the main ceremony of the 150th anniversary of Anton Martin Slomšek's arrival in Maribor and the tenth anniversary of his beatification. At the ceremony, Spanish prelate Santos Abril y Castelló gave a speech in front of about 10,000 spectators.[52] In November 2018, Ljudski vrt hosted a live television debate between the 17 candidates for a new mayor of Maribor.[53]