the yas hotel -- abu dhabi keepin up with the mohammeds in dubai?

 

 

Abu Dhabi Hotels

Abu Dhabi Nears the Finish Line With Their Racetrack-Side Hotel

Where: Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates

 

 

Remember when we hinted at Abu Dhabi's plan to compete with Dubai's entertainment by building themselves a Ferrari Theme Park, F1 racetrack and track-side hotel? Well, they've actually gone and started the thing; at least the hotel. The structure of it is complete, and currently the construction workers are hemming the glass cloak that will give the building a modular look (one that that reminds us of the Olympiapark in Munich).

 

The Yas, which will be the world's first five-star Formula One trackside hotel, is a monster with 500 rooms and a marina for docking your megayacht. All of this capped by the pivoting, diamond-shaped glass panels of the roof, which will produce "optical effects and spectral reflections that play against the surrounding sky, sea and desert landscape."

 

 

The interior, if you can get past the architectural innovation of the outside, will have "key influences and inspirations ranging from the aesthetics and forms associated with speed, movement and spectacle to the artistry and geometries forming the basis of ancient Islamic art and craft traditions."

 

That's all well and good, but will it have Velveeta-smothered nachos and giant beers? Because that's what comes to mind when we think of auto races. We never thought we'd live to see the day when an ultra-luxe resort opened around the concept of vacationing at an auto track like people usually do at a beach.

 

http://www.hotelchatter.com/story/2009/5/22/121915/171/hotels/Abu_Dhabi_Nears_the_Finish_Line_With_Their_Racetrack_Side_Hotel

 

meanwhile in suburban abu dhabi:

 

 

 

Critic’s Notebook

 

In Arabian Desert, a Sustainable City Rises

Duncan Chard for The New York Times

 

 

The terra-cotta-like exterior of a residential building in Masdar, a visionary city being built 20 miles from Abu Dhabi. More Photos »

 

By NICOLAI OUROUSSOFF

Published: September 25, 2010

 

ABU DHABI, United Arab Emirates — Back in 2007, when the government here announced its plan for “the world’s first zero-carbon city” on the outskirts of Abu Dhabi, many Westerners dismissed it as a gimmick — a faddish follow-up to neighboring Dubai’s half-mile-high tower in the desert and archipelago of man-made islands in the shape of palm trees.

 

 

This is the first in a series of articles exploring how large-scale urban projects are transforming parts of the Arab world.

 

.Multimedia

 

Graphic Planning a Sustainable City in the Desert

.

Slide Show A Tour of Masdar

 

 

 

 

Designed by Foster & Partners, a firm known for feats of technological wizardry, the city, called Masdar, would be a perfect square, nearly a mile on each side, raised on a 23-foot-high base to capture desert breezes. Beneath its labyrinth of pedestrian streets, a fleet of driverless electric cars would navigate silently through dimly lit tunnels. The project conjured both a walled medieval fortress and an upgraded version of the Magic Kingdom’s Tomorrowland.

 

Well, those early assessments turned out to be wrong. By this past week, as people began moving into the first section of the project to be completed — a 3 ½-acre zone surrounding a sustainability-oriented research institute — it was clear that Masdar is something more daring and more noxious.

 

more:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/26/arts/design/26masdar.html?_r=1&hp

hmm....

 

 

Saturday 24 November 2012 14.23 EST

 

Christo plans sculpture of oil drums to tower above sands of Abu Dhabi

The artist who bundled up the Reichstag plans to create the world's biggest and most expensive sculpture in Abu Dhabi

 

He is an artist best known for wrapping the Reichstag in Berlin and for siting thousands of coloured umbrellas across valleys in Japan and America. Now Christo is creating for Abu Dhabi a colossal structure that he claims will be the world's biggest permanent sculpture. Estimated construction costs of $340m (£212m) would also make it the world's most expensive.

 

A 150-metre-high, flat-topped pyramid would be taller than St Paul's Cathedral or St Peter's Basilica and would overshadow the Great Pyramid of Giza – creating Abu Dhabi's answer to Egypt's pyramids or Mecca's Kaaba.

 

The Mastaba, made out of 410,000 multicoloured oil barrels, is planned for what Christo describes as a "spectacularly beautiful" desert landscape, Al Gharbia, 100 miles from Abu Dhabi city.

 

 

http://m.guardiannews.com/artanddesign/2012/nov/24/christo-mega-sculpture-abu-dhabi

 

 

I wonder if Nermal made it there OK.

I'm in Dubai for work and went up to Abu Dhabi on Saturday to snap some photos of the new CCF facility. Both the main building and the seaside location are stunning. There's a dedicated bikepath / boardwalk nestled between the building and the waterfront. If you walk down the boardwalk, there are seaside cafes and a beautiful, fancy mall. While there's some room for improvement in the plan (first floor retail along the board, the suburban-like campus entrance, etc), this is some of the best urbanism in the entire Gulf.

 

 

Here's some context on the rest of the neighborhood.

 

(Photo 1) There are skyscrapers going up everywhere. This picture shows only a small portion.

(Photo 2) A block down the seaside boardwalk there are cafes at the entrance of the Galleria Mall.

(Photo 3) This is sunset from the main atrium of the Galleria Mall. CCF site is still under construction, but this is what the views will look like when complete.

Very Cool!

Who was the design Architect?

So I'm guessing the only time of day you can actually use that boardwalk is between about sunset to 9am the next day between April and October?

STUNNING!

 

 

And then we have the crap CCF is producing here

 

 

interesting to see!

 

hmm, right up to the waterfront, eh? so they are capable of more urban design.

^Clinic had nothing to do with the design

then make that aware and thus capable

Who was the design Architect?

 

HDR based in Omaha Nebraska

 

 

http://www.hdrinc.com/portfolio/cleveland-clinic-abu-dhabi-hospital

i found that they did review of the new westbound I-90 bridge too. i think thats all in the area. nothing at the cle clinic itself.