A 134,000 m2 mixed‐use complex located on two steep hillside plots linked together by a pedestrian crossing. The lower, larger site consists of five towers rising from a retail podium with stepped terraces and stairways linking the podium levels to an important merging commercial corridor. The towers, (with a wellness centre, hotel, apartment hotel, apartments and office buildings) will rise nineteen floors above the lower street level. The second, smaller plot consists of a large outdoor plaza with a ten story office tower and below grade retail and leisure spaces. DIP has obtained Fosters+Partners for the architectural design of the project, Buro Happold for the conceptual and schematic electromechanical design phases and maisam architects & engineers as the local collaborating architects. As architects of record, maisam have assisted Foster+Partners through the schematic and design development phases, completed the majority of the construction documentation.

The residential block is the fourth block on the podium. The design of the apartments is simple, with the aim to keep partition walls to a minimum, ensure flexibility of use and allow for one’s own spatial intervention. Kitchen, reception and dining room are conceived as one big open space, with access to a long, wide balcony offering views over the city. The bedrooms, being part of the private realm of the house, occupy a designated area and are accessible through a wide corridor where cupboards, library, book shelves, can be built into the wall. Most of the floor plates are one single big apartment, which can be divided into two smaller ones. There is also the possibility of having ‘small’ duplexes (which will be either 2 or 3 bedroom) on the lower levels, whereby the floor plate is divided into 4 to allow for four individual duplexes, accessible on alternate levels and at the upper levels, to have either a single large penthouse or two large duplexes. In the duplex apartment, the two floors are linked through a staircase and a double height space. The reception is located at the lower level whilst the living room is upstairs with two of the bedrooms. The third bedroom remains at the lower floor. The apartments will be sold “off- plan” and the market will ultimately dictate the mix of the apartment types. Should the
entire residential block become duplexes, and the floor to ceiling height reduced the number of floors would increase.