November 13, 2006 | Recommend this Article »

From One Thousand and One Arabian Nights

Four kinds of stone characterize the new Emirates Palace Hotel in Abu Dhabi.

The »Emirates Palace« has an actual hotel area equivalent to approx. 30 football pitches, which corresponds to a total floor space of 243000 square metres. The hotel offers the ultimate in luxury in every respect. Plus: stone, stone and more stone. A total of 130000 square metres of mainly granite natural stone slabs have been installed over a total length of a kilometre – from one end of the east wing to the other end of the west wing.
The construction of this huge hotel building on behalf of the Abu Dhabi government started in December 2001. The work on the exterior facades started in 2003 and was completed as early as the beginning of 2004. A team of over 10000 persons worked on the »palace building«. The official opening is planned for the end of 2006.

Red stones for the facade

The exterior facade of the building is to reflect the various colours of Arabian desert sand. The architects selected Salisbury Pink (USA), Red Royal (Brazil), Jacaranda (Brazil) and Indian Juparana (India) for this. An important selection factor besides the suitability and durability of the materials, which are exposed to heavy temperature fluctuations and extreme solar irradiation, was the colour of the natural stones. The architects decided on two basic colours: pink and red. They then played with the different structure and grain of the four different kinds of granite and with various finishes from polished to sand-blasted. The natural stone work was carried out jointly by Campolonghi Italia S.r.l. of Montignoso and Savema S.P.A. of Pietrasanta. They worked some 6000 cubic metres of natural stone and delivered this to Abu Dhabi in 468 containers within ten months.