About the Building
United Center (The UC, The Madhouse on Madison, The House that Jordan Built) is an indoor arena on the Near West Side of Chicago, Illinois, United States. It is home to the Chicago Bulls of the National Basketball Association (NBA) and the Chicago Blackhawks of the National Hockey League (NHL), named after its corporate sponsor, United Airlines.
Opened in 1994, the United Center replaced the Chicago Stadium, its now demolished predecessor. The first event held at the United Center was WWF Summerslam. Due to the lockout, the Chicago Blackhawks did not move in until January 1995. In 1996, the United Center hosted the 1996 Democratic National Convention, where it first introduced a new style four-screen speech prompting system for speakers consisting of two glass teleprompters, accompanied by an inset lectern monitor, and for the first time, a large under-camera confidence monitor.
Home of the iconic Michael Jordan statue built in 1994, it is housed in the United Center atrium which was completed as an addition to the arena in 2017. Additional statues include Bobby Hull and Stan Mikita, while a statue of various Blackhawk players sit to the north on Madison Street, where the former Chicago Stadium was located.
With a capacity of nearly 21,000, the United Center is the largest arena by capacity in the National Basketball Association.
