Swimming at the 2012 Summer Olympics

The London Aquatics Centre is an indoor facility with two 50-metre (164-foot) swimming pools and a 25-metre (82-foot) diving pool in Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in Stratford, London. The centre, designed by architect Zaha Hadid as one of the main venues of the 2012 Summer Olympics and the 2012 Summer Paralympics, was used for the swimming, diving and synchronised swimming events. After significant modification, the centre opened to the public in March 2014.

The diving competitions at the 2012 Olympic Games in London took place from 29 July to 11 August at the Aquatics Centre within the Olympic Park. It was one of four aquatic sports at the Games, along with swimming, water polo and synchronised swimming. The 2012 Games featured competitions in eight events (men and women events each of): 3m springboard, synchronised 3m springboard, 10m platform, and synchronised 10m platform.The diving featured 136 athletes representing 25 countries. All divers must be at least 14 years old on or by 31 December 2012.China was the most successful nation, topping the medal table with six golds and ten in total.

Synchronized swimming competitions at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London were held from Sunday 5 August to Friday 10 August, at the London Aquatics Centre. Two medal events were included in the programme — women's duet and women's team — with 100 athletes participating.

The women's synchronised 3 metre springboard diving competition at the 2012 Olympic Games in London took place on 29 July at the Aquatics Centre within the Olympic Park. The Chinese team of He Zi and Wu Minxia won the gold medal.

12 Endeavour Square, also known as 1 Westfield Avenue, is a commercial building within the International Quarter London in Stratford, London, occupied by the Financial Conduct Authority and UNICEF. It was completed in 2018, its developers were Lendlease and LCR, and its architect was Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners.

The Water Polo Arena was a temporary sporting venue of the 2012 Summer Olympics held in London from 27 July to 12 August 2012. It was situated in the south-east corner of the Olympic Park, alongside the Aquatics Centre, and opposite the Olympic Stadium on the opposite bank of the Waterworks River. The Aquatics Centre and Water Polo Arena were adjacent to each other in one of the most compact areas of the park. To make the best use of the space available, some back-of-house facilities, such as space for broadcasters, catering and security, were shared between the two venues.

International Quarter London (also known as IQL, The International Quarter and TIQ) is a business development project built by Lendlease and commercial developer LCR in a subdivision of Stratford, London, England. It is located between the site of the Westfield Stratford City shopping centre and the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park. The postcode designations are part of E20. Endeavour Square is part of the International Quarter.

The ArcelorMittal Orbit (often referred to as the Orbit Tower or its original name, Orbit) is a 114.5-metre (376-foot) sculpture and observation tower in the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in Stratford, London. It is Britain's largest piece of public art, and is intended to be a permanent lasting legacy of London's hosting of the 2012 Summer Olympic and Paralympic Games, assisting in the post-Olympics regeneration of the Stratford area. Sited between the Olympic Stadium (now called London Stadium) and the Aquatics Centre, it allows visitors to view the whole Olympic Park from two observation platforms. Orbit was designed by Turner-Prize winning artist Anish Kapoor and Cecil Balmond of Arup Group, an engineering firm. Announced on 31 March 2010, it was expected to be completed by December 2011. The project came about after Mayor of London Boris Johnson and Olympics Minister Tessa Jowell decided in 2008 that the Olympic Park needed "something extra". Designers were asked for ideas for an "Olympic tower" at least 100 metres (330 ft) high: Orbit was the unanimous choice from proposals considered by a nine-person advisory panel. Kapoor and Balmond believed that Orbit represented a radical advance in the architectural field of combining sculpture and structural engineering, and that it combined both stability and instability in a work that visitors can engage with and experience via an incorporated spiral walkway. It has been both praised and criticised for its bold design, and has especially received criticism as a vanity project of questionable lasting use or merit as a public art project. The project was expected to cost £19.1 million, with £16 million coming from Britain's then-richest man, the steel tycoon Lakshmi Mittal, Chairman of the ArcelorMittal steel company, and the balance of £3.1 million coming from the London Development Agency. The name "ArcelorMittal Orbit" combines the name of Mittal's company, as chief sponsor, with Orbit, the original working title for Kapoor and Balmond's design. The ArcelorMittal Orbit temporarily closed after the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games while the South Plaza (in which Orbit is positioned) underwent reconstruction for its long-term legacy use as a public outdoor space. It re-opened to the public on 5 April 2014. The structure incorporates the world's tallest and longest – 178 m (584 ft) – tunnel slide, designed by Carsten Höller. The idea was originally envisioned by the London Legacy Development Corporation as a way to attract more visitors to the tower. The slide includes transparent sections to give a "different perspective" of the twisting red tower and was completed in June 2016. This follows an option to abseil down the tower, introduced in 2014.

Shrouds of the Somme is an artwork by British artist Rob Heard which commemorates the 72,396 servicemen from the British Commonwealth with no known grave, whose names are recorded at Thiepval Memorial as missing presumed dead at the Battle of the Somme. It is estimated that more than three million men fought in the battle, and more than one million men were wounded or killed, making it one of the bloodiest battles in human history. The work comprises 72,396 small human figurines, each separately wrapped in a calico shroud which was cut and sewn by hand. The full installation was laid out at the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park from 8 to 18 November 2018, over the centenary of the Armistice of 11 November 1918 that ended the First World War.

Stratford Works was the locomotive-building works of the Great Eastern Railway situated at Stratford, London, England. The original site of the works was located in the 'V' between the Great Eastern Main Line and the Stratford to Lea Bridge route and in the early years was also the home of Stratford Locomotive Depot. The final part of the works closed in 1991. Overall Stratford works built 1,702 locomotives; 5,500 passenger vehicles and 33,000 goods wagons (although a significant number of these were built at the nearby Temple Mills wagon works when wagon building moved from the Stratford site in 1896).

Bow Back Rivers or Stratford Back Rivers is a complex of waterways between Bow and Stratford in east London, England, which connect the River Lea to the River Thames. Starting in the twelfth century, works were carried out to drain Stratford Marshes and several of the waterways were constructed to power watermills. Bow Creek provided the final outfall to the Thames, and the other channels were called Abbey Creek, Channelsea River, City Mill River, Prescott Channel, Pudding Mill River, Saint Thomas Creek, Three Mills Back River, Three Mills Wall River and Waterworks River. The rivers have been subject to change over centuries, with Alfred the Great diverting the river in 896 to create a second channel, and Queen Matilda bridging both channels around 1110 by paying for the construction of Bow Bridge. Because the river system was tidal as far as Hackney Wick, several of the mills were tide mills, including those at Abbey Mills and those at Three Mills, one of which survives. Construction of the New River in the seventeenth century to supply drinking water to London, with subsequent extraction by waterworks companies, led to a lowering of water levels, and the river was gradually canalised to maintain navigation. Significant changes occurred with the creation of the Lee Navigation in 1767, which resulted in the construction of the Hackney Cut and the Limehouse Cut, allowing barges to bypass most of the back rivers. A major reconstruction of the rivers took place in the 1930s, authorised by the River Lee (Flood Relief) Act, but by the 1960s, commercial usage of the waterways had largely ceased. Deteriorating infrastructure led to the rivers dwindling to little more than tidal creeks, and they were categorised in 1968 as having no economic or long-term future. However, British Waterways decided that their full restoration was an important aim in 2002, and the construction of the main stadium for the 2012 Summer Olympics on an island formed by the rivers provided funding to construct a new lock and sluices which stabilised water levels throughout the Olympic site. It was hoped that significant amounts of materials for the construction of the Olympic facilities would be delivered by barge, but this did not happen. Improvements to the channels which form a central feature of the Olympic Park included the largest aquatic planting scheme ever carried out in Britain.

Stratford TMD was a traction maintenance depot located in Stratford, London, England close to the Great Eastern Main Line. It was located just west of Stratford station, on a site now occupied by Stratford International station. The depot was at one time the biggest on the London and North Eastern Railway with locomotives covering duties from express services to freight workings in London's docks. Locomotive construction took place at the adjacent Stratford Works and Stratford TMD was initially located on this site in the V between the Lea Bridge and Great Eastern Main Lines. In 1871 the depot moved to the 'teardrop' of lines to the west of the present Stratford Regional station. The depot closed in 2001, as part of the construction of the Channel Tunnel Rail Link.