Heart of Jeddah

The Heart of Jeddah is a mixed-use development planned around the Grand Canal including 2.4 million sf of office space, five-start luxury hotel, 500-key convention center hotel, one million sf convention center and 400-key business hotel The design of the Heart of Jeddah is influenced directly by the desert floral/fauna found in Saudi Arabia. Throughout the Heart of Jeddah project, this theme is repeated in balcony railings, signage, banners, flooring patterns and screen designs, among many other elements. The undulating forms of the roof line, incorporating clerestory into the slits and edges between the roof shapes, is intended to look like a blooming Lilly, where the structure of the hall itself references petals poised to bloom outward. The horizontality of the convention centre and its smooth skin, when juxtaposed against the rising singular Hotel Tower creates a contrast that amplifies the relationship of the simplicity of the large roof forms against the highly-detailed mashrabiya screen. Both of the buildings are oriented to be open and transparent to the north, facing the water. The south and west facades of the Convention Centre are protected from the harsh Middle-Eastern sunlight with a thick, patterned metal panel skin.