We chose this name to build an a-temporal city where the cyclical idea of returning was present and celebrated. In Arabic culture Aidah means “one’s who returns”. Our intention, is to use a temporary installation not as a self-referenced narcissistic display, but as a device that positively contributes to a debate about the future development of the Middle Eastern Metropolis. Most of all, Aidah is a dream, a suggestion, an immaterial city that aims to investigate what makes a city a city. If the region wants to strengthen and develop its future in the long term, it has to tie itself to a sustainable reality, not limiting its narration to just hyper bombastic urban scenographies.Īidah is a provocative representation of a process, a diagrammatic illustration of a portion of Middle Eastern history translated into architectural forms.

But now, the present time, it seems able to combine together its cultural, social and political input, creating a new city vision with a strong identity. The Middle east region started as an inflated reality, balancing on the verge of becoming a theme park made of a collection of expensive capricious architectures. Now, events like Dubai Design Week aim to widen the city’s foundation spectrum and focus on art, design and architecture as active tools to make the city, a city. Aside from the obvious business vocation, the new-unknown identity focused on tourism, fun and wonder.

This process had to be planned and didn’t happen spontaneously under the leveling action of history, people and time.ĭubai’s time scale is on steroids, and its future had to happen, now.

The region had to re-imagine its future and create its own new, enticing identity. But this semi-utopian development approached its climax almost 10 years ago.

Cities bloomed from the arid desert and the whole region became an incredible and alluring place, attracting people from all over the world. This growth rate and the incredible wealth has made the unthinkable possible. The Middle East Region has boomed in the last 50 years with an economy based on oil.

The Unknown City instaling