The London Aquatic Centre – designed by the late Zaha Hadid – has become the first London 2012 venue to achieve an ‘excellent’ rating in Sport England’s facility assessment, Quest.

In order to achieve the accolade the centre went through a mystery visit and a two-day assessment. It was recognised for its “excellent swimming lessons”, event management and legacy programme.

Quest, according to Sport England, is a “tool for continuous improvement” aimed at the management of sports facilities, which encourages good practice and a customer-focused management framework.

Gregg Holland, venue manager at the London Aquatics Centre, said he was “very proud” to be recognised for the award.

“Quest is not a tick-box exercise; it is an ongoing programme of assessments to help us improve our facility for both our customers and staff, and a great way to demonstrate our achievements since we re-opened for the public,” he added.

“By meeting Quest's high standards for excellent centres, London Aquatics Centre has shown its commitment not only to provide quality facilities and service to its customers, but also to fulfil its Olympic promise of providing a lasting legacy,” said Quest director Caroline Constantine.

Located in the Queen Elizabeth Park in Stratford, London, the London Aquatics Centre was used for swimming, diving and synchronised swimming events during the 2012 Olympics and Paralympic Games.

The venue has welcomed more than 1.7m visitors in two years, hosting 3,600 adults and children who are learning to swim each week and staging a number of events such as the Invictus Games and the British Swimming Championships. It is operated by charitable enterprise GLL on behalf of the London Legacy Development Corporation.

Costing £269m (US$379.2m, €333.5m) to build, the London Aquatics Centre was nominated for RIBA’s prestigious Stirling Prize in 2014. It was designed by renowned architect Zaha Hadid, who passed away last week.

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