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United Arab Emirates
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Abu Dhabi Investment Authority Headquarters

File includes 38 drawings: (25 plans, 5 sections, 4 elevations, 2 exterior perspectives, 2 details: glazing.) and 7 photographs (3 prints of model, 4 contact sheets with 47 images total. The Investment Authority site lies directly opposite a series of broad gardens and is very prominent in its visibility. As such the project was to be a significant contributor to the urban design of the city, and the building's proportions and its relationship to the street were important criteria. The design for the new headquarters for the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority was prepared in 1978 in response to an International Invited Design Competition. The site for this project was on the Abu Dhabi "Corniche" albeit at that time in its infancy. The Corniche today is a splendid 10 km Avenue of high quality development and lush tropical gardens with lovely promenades along the sea front. In order to provide a distinctive column-free "banking hall" it was decided to suspend the building from its core walls and columns. This allowed the ground floor to be completely column free and facilitated the design of interior/exterior relationships between the banking hall and the site landscaping. A raised banking hall provided a podium housing below grade parking and improved views to the sea across the Corniche. The structural effect of the building coupled with the tall slender proportions of the glazing created a sense of lightness and gracefulness particularly important to this owner.

AI Ain University Competition (United Arab Emirates University, University Town Project)

FIle consists of 87 drawings and 20 photographs prepared for Sheik Aid bin Naraya, Minister of Education, United Arab Emirates. The competition design prepared for this proposed University, in the oasis city of AI Ain in the United Arab Emirates, sought to provide a modem interpretation of the historical principles of Islamic design. The project was conceived as an axial plan with crossing axes at the entries to the various faculties, achieving their own specific identity. Particularly important was the need to weave the existing buildings of the University into the plan. An architectural vocabulary was developed as a reinterpretation of "desert" architecture, whereby walls were conceived massively in nature with small punched openings to admit light. Such walls protected the inner spaces from the harsh surrounding environment and these spaces were to be enriched in a variety of ways. Spaces were conceived in a hierarchical manner by means of size and finish material. Courtyards, some internalized and climate controlled, became the focus of the architecture, and were protected from the environment by high walls and overhead trellises. Each courtyard was provided with a decorative water feature and appropriate landscaping. In keeping with most Islamic buildings, particular emphasis was placed on the internal nature of space, doorways, passages, and gates to each space. The major entrance to the project is approached directly by the main axis where an enveloping semicircular administration building accepts visitors and dignitaries. The axial plan is broken only by the various "prayer" spaces, or Mosques, which turn in the direction of Mecca. Particularly important to the project were the series of gates at the axial entry points, giving the project its outward architectural richness.