twofour54° (Abu Dhabi Media Zone)

SUSTAINABLE INFRASTRUCTURE PLANNING, ESTIDAMA STRATEGY

Named after the geographic coordinates of Abu Dhabi, symbolic of our goal to put Abu Dhabi on the map as the capital of content creators, twofour54° was launched in 2008 to accelerate Abu Dhabi’s media industry. This dynamic media zone provided the infrastructure and services to attract international, regional, and local media businesses. 

While at BuroHappold, Steven supported a masterplanning team led by Bernard Tschumi Architects.  This purpose of the masterplan was to establish form and function and clear sustainable leadership for a key site on the Mena Zayed waterfront. A key outcome of the planning process was a bold move to orient all vertical buildings off the plinth connector to east-west orientation.  This created a sense of branded place for twofour54°, framed the most impactful views, optimized for daylight and created a balanced energy and indoor quality in one of the harshest climates in the world.

Following the masterplanning phase, two teams were chosen to advance the site development.  The site development was broken into a Zone 1development plan, led by UNStudio and a Zone 2 development plan, led by KPF.  BuroHappold supported both development plans with  integrated sustainable systems, climate response and infrastructure planning.  Steven led the integrated infrastructure and sustainable strategies for the full site (zones 1 and 2).

At the time of this planning and early design effort, Estidama, Abu Dhabi’s sustainability rating system was just launching. Estidama is a building design methodology as well as a tracking system, which guided the specifics for constructing and operating buildings and communities more sustainably in Abu Dhabi.  Steven led the Estidama strategy connecting across scales for infrastructure and building-scale performance. 

Location: Abu Dhabi, UAE

Client: twofour54° Date: 2013

Collaborators: UN Studio, KPF, Adamson Associates, and Diller Scofidio + Renfro.