Press

Dubai will claim to boast the highest restaurant in the world early next year when Emaar launches an outlet on floor 122 of Burj Khalifa. EHG has announced that the restaurant will be called Atmosphere and will be a unique addition to high-end dining in Dubai and the Middle East. Company chief executive officer, Marc Dardenne, told Caterer Middle East that the outlet, as a concept, had a world dimension.

A highlight is a spectacular display of Downtown Dubai, the 500-acre destination development anchored by Burj Khalifa, the world's tallest building housing the world's first Armani Hotel. With the Dubai Mall, possibly the world's largest shopping and entertainment destination, several world-class hotels, residences, and prime office space, Downtown Dubai underscores Emaar's strategy of developing fully integrated communities that energize the economy.

At 828 meters (2,717 feet), the Burj Khalifa in Dubai has the famous distinction (or infamous distinction if you’re an acrophobiac) of being the tallest building in the world, and EHG looks to capitalize. The new restaurant, called “Atmosphere”, will be on the 122-nd floor of the Burj Khalifa, which is already home to the first Armani Hotel – the hotel chain built in corporation with Italian fashion machine Armani.

You make the point that it was defined, this decade in architecture, it was defined on the vertical access by the World Trade Center's coming down and this enormous tower -- the Burj of Dubai, the Burj Khalifa, I guess now properly -- over in Dubai. And also on the horizontal by the devastation of Katrina. I mean, it goes all ways. We've had economic booms and busts in the past decade. We've had floods and terrorist attacks. We have had creation and destruction in all of their extremes. Those forces are reflected by the buildings around us.

The 828-meter-high Burj Khalifa in Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE), currently the highest skyscraper in the world, also has state-of-the-art disaster prevention measures. The 160-story building has four safety zones on the 42nd, 75th, 111th and 138th floors. These shelters can accommodate up to 6,500 people and are designed to last for two hours after a fire has broken out.

After six days of glaring color — Armani himself featured watermelon red in his Emporio collection shown earlier in the week — it was a real surprise to see a show where the brightest shade was midnight blue. In his fashion notes, Armani said he drew inspiration for the collection from the Tuareg, the blue nomads of the desert, so called for the dark face covers worn by the men. The designer probably has desert on his mind since the opening of his luxury hotel in Dubai earlier this year. A dunned version was projected at the end of the runway.

It's difficult to believe that a $1,000-a-night hotel designed by fashion designer Giorgio Armani in the world's tallest building could ever be considered understated. Yet in Dubai, where bars with multicolor fluorescent ceilings are considered classy, theArmani Hotel Dubai manages to fill that niche.

It may be tall, and it may be grand, but we don’t think the Burj Khalifa is worth boasting about. Even so, this towering blight on Dubai’s sustainable horizon took “project of the year” at the 3rd annual Middle East Architecture Award ceremony held in Dubai’s Park Hyatt on September 28th, 2010.

Leading Middle Eastern public relations consultancy ASDA’A Burson-Marsteller has picked up the International Business Awards’ title of ‘PR Campaign of the Year’ for its 5-year campaign to launch the 828m tall Burj Khalifa in Dubai. The agency, along with winners from 28 nations, was honoured at a gala ceremony held in Istanbul on Monday.

Hundreds of architects, engineers and consultants packed out Dubai’s Park Hyatt last night for the third annual Middle East Architect awards. Projects from Saudi Arabia to Libya scooped awards, with Dubai’s Burj Khalifa winning project of the year and local firm X Architects winning both Best Boutique Firm and Best Principal, jointly awarded to founders Ahmed Al Ali and Farid Esmaeil.