As part of a conditioned acquisition, we've been approached by MAG group in order to develop a project beyond a feasibility study.

The idea was to develop three towers in an already developed site, the basement, podium, and landing was already built for a previous development that founds its end in 2008 due to lack of funding.

In essence, the approach was simple: either maintain or substitute the existent structure, but ensuring the new programme was strong enough to complement the current residential offer in the neighborhood.

Far from challenging the site conditions, the first assessment was a thoughtful structural analysis of the built structure in order to understand its full potential, once the engineers reverted the results, the design process started taking shape with two possible scenarios: the first one continuing with the same concrete approach for the rest of the development while the second combined steel structure in certain elements in order to achieve height and a sky bridge.

In both cases, the main programme was residential, with a strong commercial component on the unifying podium levels, while incorporating a hotel and serviced apartments on the top levels, the correlation between the elements was either independent and linear in the case of the homogeneous concrete structure or interlinked in the case of the mixed steel one.

One of the defining elements for the development was the incorporation of a social component since Cluster Z is located at the end of a series of clusters around a lake, with serious difficulties to link their programs and users. The inclusion of an open-air floating platform at the end of the lake was incorporated in order to facilitate users flow while generating a pole of attraction between neighboring commercial areas.


Name: Cluster Z
Location: Dubai, UAE
Client: MAG
Status: Design Phase