How does our environment influence us?

I am writing this essay about one of the tallest and most luxurious hotel in the World – Burj Al Arab in Dubai. The Burj Al Arab Hotel also known as the Tower of the Arabs was designed by Tom Wright of WKK Architects in 1933 and completed in 1999. The design and construction were managed by Canadian engineer Rick Gregory of WS Atkins - one of the world’s leading design, engineering and project management consultancies. Interior of the building was designed by KCA International Designers.

In the early nineties Dubai scrum Prince Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum knew that Dubai’s easily accessible oil would not last forever and the project is his response to the economic time bomb his country confronted. His solution was to invest in the city itself with the intention to create a worldwide tourist destination.The brief was to create a symbol for Dubai and to create most luxurious hotel of which had not been seen before, show the modern trends that Dubai has been moving towards. The sail shaped hotel stands 321 meters high on an artificial island in the Arabian Gulf. The 202 super luxurious suites inside are accessed from one of the tallest atriums in the world.To take up the challenge Shake decided for a British architect Tom Wright and his team who have reputation for innovative engineering but they more used to design schools and offices. As I mentioned above the brief was to create an icon for Dubai, a building that would become identical with the place, just as Egypt has the Great Pyramids or Sydney its Opera House, so United Arab Emirates was to have the Burj Al Arab. The goal was to create something simple but unique and recognizable. They was considering that the building becomes an icon when its form is simple and so they decided that if they could draw a building simple with few lines and it would be still recognizable and iconic not only as a building but as a place that would be exactly what they are looking for.

Notice these simple drawings below - these buildings are iconic for a certain place and most of the people recognize it and know where the buildings exactly are.

Reference: http://static.squarespace.com/static/519f87b2e4b02061e74db6b6/t/523c2a8ee4b0f0cfeaff5207/1379674766598/Creating+the+Burj+Al+Arab.pdf

Dubai is a city of the sun, sand and sea and sailing is a popular sport in the UAE therefore the concept of the building is a shape of the sail floating on the sea.And when I wrote the sail floating on the sea, I meant literally floating on the sea. Concept of the sail shaped hotel was designed to be sitting out at sea. This required to build an island as a base which was constructed 300M off shore in 6M deep water. Tom Wright and his team didn’t have an easy task - to construct a skyscraper this height out at sea on an artificial island.The building should also represent United Arab Emirates and its culture. The culture which comes from Arabian culture and has been influenced by Persian culture.

- simple and instantly recognizable

- only four lines

-

One of the tallest hotels in the world – in shape of the sail

Reference:http://wkkarchitects.com/#/burj-al-arab/

Dubai is a city of the sun, sand and sea but also a city of the changeable and extreme weather. That means that the construction must have to stand firm against gulf storms and earthquakes. The plan was to produce a low-lying island capable resisting natural elements. One of the main problems was waves hitting the island. Architects had an option to make the rocket island however that would mean that the island would have to be far too large to keep it safe. However rocket technology is proof and rocks are locally easily accessible.Mike MC Nicholas - Island Engineer and a member of WS Atkins was responsible for the island safety and he had to make sure that the island as a base point is protected. He decided to experiment with pioneering concrete blocks (shed units) designed in order to reduce impact of the waves. Finally after 3 weeks of testing Nicholas was sure that sheds will work so they could keep the island low - 7M out of the water.

Image of the man-made island’s construction

Reference: http://static.squarespace.com/static/519f87b2e4b02061e74db6b6/t/523c2a8ee4b0f0cfeaff5207/1379674766598/Creating+the+Burj+Al+Arab.pdf

The second stage of the construction was to drill a steal wall in the center of the island in shape of triangle. Sand was used to fill up the island inside the sheet pills. The sand fill was just temporary and used as a working platform to build the main building piles. Another real challenge for Nicholas and Atkins team was to remove the sand fill. Main questions as how to stop the sea water coming into the structure while removing the sand fill, how to stop the sea water coming around the structure from the underneath and flooding it. Questions about the weight of the sea and the pressure. To keep the sea out Nicholas decided to inject liquid cement into the sand to seal off the steal walls from bellow. This could be dangerous as the pressure of the sea water increases as the sand fill is removed. The cement seal was to be tested to the limit. Although the nature could be really dangerous in this case and the bottom could explode and kill hundreds of workers in the worst case it eventually worked.

It has taken a year to build the island. The third stage of the project was to drill the basis which is necessary for all skyscrapers. The team searching the bedrock drilled deep into the seabed but there was no solid rock to support the basis for the construction. The

architects decided to support the skyscraper using steel reinforced concrete foundation piles drilled deep into the sand. Finally in 1996 the construction at the hotel itself began.

The hotel has concrete walls and floors which are partially stiffened by the main lift core. Also huge cross braces are fixed inside the atrium behind the fabric wall to tie the whole structure together. But concrete walls and floors itself wouldn’t be capable against the Gulf weather. To protect the building against extreme weather, Tom Wright in collaboration with architects had to again think of new techniques and innovations. They devised a giant steel structure also known as an exoskeleton - a series of vast diagonal trusses which brace the building from outside. This giant steel structure was first designed to hold structure's form but designers combined important with useful and it has become an essential part of the structure in terms of visual aspect. If we look at the hotel this giant structure makes the building unique. It immensely supported the visual effect of the building in this case beyond architects had to overcome real obstacles.However before the gigantic steel exoskeleton was manufactured and then lifted and tied together with the megastructure engineers were solving another issue and it was that the steel increases its size as the temperature increases. In Dubai temperatures can vary as much as 14 degrees in a day. That means that the trusses which had to fit into place with pinpoint accuracy could expand and would never fit their precise point (could vary up to 5 CM). One of the Atkins architect came up with a break solution and the work could continue.

Headed by wind engineer it was then essential to test the building of the unusual shape against the wind. The wind blowing over edges of the steel construction could create miniature tornadoes which could threat the entire building. The solution to protect the building was hanging weight called tuned mass damper - a device mounted in structure to reduce the amplitude of mechanical vibrations.11 of these mechanisms were installed through the construction of the exoskeleton to avoid the threat.

In 1997 the main construction work was drawing to an end and interior decorations have started. There is much more to mention on this project however I focused on the main construction and how engineers and architects successfully overcame real world obstacles against tremendous odds of the environment.I also didn't choose two designers as I should. I was trying to look at this project from a different perspective and paid attention to designer Tom Wright and WS Atkins Group. The hotel Burj Al Arab is a huge project and I wanted to show how much work and effort is behind this project and how they have had to consider all the problematic. I had no choice but this project and I knew that this is exactly what I want to write about from the beginning of the work assignment. Somebody who would read my essay could say that it doesn’t seem to be saying anything about environment or how the environment influences us. But what does it actually mean: 'How the environment influences us'? And it leads me to the next question: 'what is the actually meaning of the word Environment?’ We have different types of environment, we can consider the environment as a place in which we live (house, town, country, etc.) or people who we

live with (family, friends, colleagues, government, etc.), and we might consider it as weather or the amount of the pollution in the whole world. These are just few examples of the environment however we can environment simply consider as anything. All these aspects influence our behavior, health, the way how we look or what we dress, our culture, economy, language, human development, progress or evolution, simply everything. The environment influences us and we influence the environment in same way. What I wanted to say and point out in my work is that to construct a building (construct a building in this case but it applies to anything in our lives) is not only about planning and designing and everything has a deeper meaning. The whole project started on the basis of the economic crisis and oil shortage which was absolutely necessary for Dubai's economy (Dubai's economy was built on revenues from the oil industry). Dubai’s oil reserves have reduced over the past decades and were expected to be exhausted within 20 years. This is a huge example to show how the environment/oil shortage affected the whole country of UAE and changed industrial Dubai to a city looking to the future.

I also think that as a student of interior design the idea of my work should be related with design or architecture. I have spent a lot of time fully researching about this project and first before I could even start with whole essay had to understand the whole structure/project, how all the techniques work and gain an insight into it. For this reason each paragraph in the main body describes how the architects were facing issues about the actual structure with regard to the environment.Just to make my thought easier to understand. Photograph displayed below shows Dubai during the gulf storm. Storm of this size could threat or even demolish every building without thorough job of the architects and engineers or also without using all these techniques mentioned above. I was trying to emphasize that the environment (mainly Dubai’s climate and the natural elements in this case) played an important role in this project and affected the whole structure of the building as well as its design and it is essential to understand that design is not only about making a space or thing unique or special but it is also very important to bring a lot of functionality and make a place fit for purpose.

Image of Dubai during the gulf storm

Reference:http://www.theguardian.com/world/gallery/2009/mar/10/saudiarabia-sandstorms

Image of Dubai in the early nineties and now

Reference:http://www.businessinsider.com/dubai-in-1990-is-totally-unrecognizable-2013-12?IR=T

To conclude the main idea of my work.Word environment is a broad term although I paid my attention to life in Dubai, hotel Burj Al Arab and its design. All these aspects that I mentioned in my work affected Dubai as a city itself, affected the structure and its design, economic situation and quality and standard of living. Dubai has become one of the world’s top holiday destinations and has become an icon.

Reference:

http://static.squarespace.com/static/519f87b2e4b02061e74db6b6/t/523c2a8ee4b0f0cfeaff5207/1379674766598/Creating+the+Burj+Al+Arab.pdf

http://wkkarchitects.com/

http://www.kca-int.com/chapter-2/#gg_cg_292

http://www.hoteldesigns.co.uk/profiles/news_406.html

http://www.building.co.uk/burj-al-arab-architect-leaves-atkins-to-set-up-rival-practice/5060871.article

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-14703998

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