The man who built Sheffield Wednesday’s Hillsborough… On Minecraft!

The level of detail on Matthew Rushton’s Minecraft build of Wednesday’s famous ground is remarkable…

It took the Bolton Wanderers fan around half a year to build, but the end result of his efforts is incredibly impressive after he went as far as recreating not only stadium’s exterior, but also interior aspects such as club lounges and the South Stand underpass.

Minecraft – a sandbox video game – gives players high levels of creativity and almost endless building possibilities, leading to a millions of people devising new ways to use it over the years. Since it’s 2011 release it’s amassed 126 million active players worldwide.

So how did a Bolton fan end up building Hillsborough, you might ask… We went and found out.

“I decided I would recreate the 23 other stadia of the teams who were in the Championship at the same time as Wanderers,” he told The Star. “Initially this would have covered the 2017/18 season, but because I finished the Reebok towards the end of that season I thought it would be more feasible to do the 2018/19 season instead, and with Sheffield Wednesday competing in the league at that time, Hillsborough would comprise part of the project.

“I did come up with a preliminary plan which would have seen Hillsborough done later in the project, however once I completed Sheffield United's Bramall Lane - which has since become one of my most popular builds - I started to become inundated with requests to do Hillsborough, and as such once I finished Swansea I decided to start work on it in early March.”

But where did it all start? Why did his stadium project even begin in the first place?

Rushton explained, “I’ve spent most of my life enamoured with architecture, which since my mid-teens has evolved to incorporate stadiums as well. As a child I would generally make models of structures using nothing more than paper and Sellotape, however being introduced to Minecraft by my brother gave me a new outlet to be creative and expand on those interests.

“I'd toyed with stadium designs since my early days on Minecraft, so we're talking 2012 when I originally started. I worked on custom designs on my brother's world, and eventually built a version of StateFarm Stadium in Arizona in 2013. I guess you could say this was my first real attempt at a stadium.

“Once I moved back to Bolton in 2014 I started recreating the Reebok (now the University of Bolton Stadium) in my own style that has steadily evolved as I’ve learnt and honed my craft. After what ended up being three-and-a-half year’s worth of work I finally completed that in early 2018 to much fanfare, which only increased when Bolton Wanderers themselves shared it on social media this past January.”

“I'd also admired the works of other builders out there such as TheHolder and PreFXDesigns so I guess you could say that emulating them was why I started building stadia.”

It took a trip to the stadium, lots of visits on Google Maps and over 480 images to make sure that he got Hillsborough as accurate as possible, and he’s explained which part was the most difficult for him to complete…

“I wouldn't say any particular aspect of the ground was fun necessarily since I enjoyed doing it as a whole,” he said. “But I will say that the area I probably felt the most pride doing was the rear end of the Kop, with the hill and the iconic lettering because I know for many this is the first part of the stadium they will see on approach.

“The hardest part, I'd have to say, would be the trusses and the structural work I had to do for the South Stand because images for this was quite hard to come by. It had a very complex design which was difficult to get right, but because I knew it would be seen when it came to the video, I had no choice but to get it done.

“I should also give a mention to the seating on the Kop itself because of the incline and the overall layout which was difficult to implement in the game. Again I put this down to a difficulty in obtaining the necessary close up images in order to build it.”

And with it wrapped up and in the bag, how does he feel about the finished article?

“Personally I was very happy with how the stadium turned out given the circumstances,” he says. There were areas that I was constantly questioning with myself, like whether or not the stadium was too tall, if there were any aspects that didn’t look right, because in the sense of my work I always strive to go into as much detail as possible. In certain cases this can result in the complete demolition and rebuild of an area if even a single part of it is out of place.

“Whenever I tackle a stadium I always do it with the club and its fans in mind, and hope that I can leave a lasting impression, which I really hope I’ve done for Sheffield Wednesday. The amount of time the stadium took to complete was around five-and-a-half months, which is relatively quick for me, so I was happy with myself for being able to up the pace while still maintaining the high level of work that I’m steadily becoming known for.”

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