Dubai!

From a small loft in Umbria to the Burj Khalifa (the tallest building in the world!) in Dubai…everything is architecture! The contrast between the desert and the tall glass buildings is certainly striking, as well as the other many incongruous aspects of this amazing city, full of people from all over the world, living and working together. Dubai is a truly global city and a business hub with some very interesting architecture (but, alas, it is also full of gross, tacky buildings), like the Burj Khalifa, an ultra modern steel and glass skyscraper 828m. tall and with 160 storeys, designed by the American architects SOM. The architecture features a triple-lobed footprint, an abstraction of the Hymenocallis flower; the levels decrease the cross section of the tower incrementally as it spirals skyward to culminate in a sculpted spire. Imposing and light at the same time, with breathtaking views of the ever-changing urban pattern of Dubai: desert, coastline, large highways and high rise architecture, that despite the recent  financial crises seems to be flourishing again.