Let’s face it, things have been a little slow, construction-wise, in our region recently. After almost a decade of breakneck development, during which project after hallucinatory project was announced on what felt at times like an almost daily basis, life has been quieter of late.
While we aren’t ones to laud the ludicrous (and have never been overly impressed by size), even we have to admit that we’ve rather missed those proposals for cloud hotels, floating mosques, rotating residential buildings, supersized pyramids and of course, stratospheric towers.
Now that things, once again, appear to be on the up, we thought we’d celebrate the completion, a couple of years later than originally planned, of one of the less ridiculous projects from those delirious years – Dubai’s Cayan Tower.
Not ringing any bells? Perhaps you remember the Infinity, then? Like Dubai’s most famous tower, which was also designed by America’s masters of the megablock, Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, this one has undergone a name change since it was first announced.
Sat at the seaward entrance to Dubai Marina, Cayan rises both literally and figuratively above its neighbours, spiralling upwards in an arrested helix towards, well, infinity. Begun in 2006, it was delayed both by the economic turbulence caused by the global crash and a series of construction difficulties, the most serious of which was the flooding of its foundations when the wall holding back the sea breached in 2007.
While it can’t claim to be the first of its kind in the world – Malmö pipped Dubai to that post back in 2001 with Santiago Calatrava’s Turning Torso – it can claim to be the tallest twisting tower. To that, we’d add the most graceful.
For unlike Calatrava’s Torso, where the cantilevered floor plates are grouped into blocks of five that twist relative to each other as they rise, Cayan’s sharper, more stylish curve results from each floorplate being rotated by 1.2°. Though seemingly negligible, expressed over the tower’s 307-metre height, the 73 floors undergo a 90° twist, permitting fortunate residents to choose between Marina or Arabian Gulf views.
In a city not otherwise known for its subtlety, this slinky, slender tower not only sets a world record and signals, potentially, that Dubai is back on track, it also makes a very welcome addition to a skyline that may be big on height but is still somewhat lacking in beauty.
WHAT Cayan Tower
WHERE Dubai
FINISHED 2013
WHY Though two years behind schedule, both for its size and for its intricate, helix structure, the 80-storey residential tower is a remarkable construction.
