A notebook is never safe from Rafael Vinoly. Over evening drinks during a recent visit to the capital, the renowned, restless New York architect - here on business related to his master plan for the campus of New York University Abu Dhabi - was constantly reaching for visual aids. "I need to take your pen," he said a few minutes into our meeting, somehow managing to make the statement (it was not so much a request) sound charming.
Dressed head to toe in black, with a sweater that curled slightly at the neck, Vinoly sat on the edge of his high-backed velveteen chair in a lounge at the Fairmont Bab Al-Bahr. In addition to using up several sheets of lined, spiral-bound paper to illustrate his thoughts, he enlisted a cloth napkin, two empty bottles of expensive sparkling water and one round, purple glass ashtray - which was mainly useful as a point of reference for its funny resemblance to Rem Koolhaas's giant spheroid building in Dubai's proposed Waterfront City.
A boyish-looking 65-year old originally from Uruguay, Vinoly has a tousled nest of pale grey hair and always wears three pairs of plastic-framed spectacles - one on his face, the other two either dangling from his neck or perched on his skull. According to a 2003 interview he gave to the New York Times, this is because he "gets hysterical if he loses his glasses". Among the handful of figures who are routinely designated as "starchitects", Vinoly is something of a borderline case. He does not appear to shrink from being a larger-than-life, media-ready personality, or from making oracular pronouncements (On Abu Dhabi: "When you think of this place, it's precisely character. It's not character-less. Quite the opposite. It just happens to be completely misunderstood.") Yet at the same time he bears a professional affinity for the nerdy, workmanlike challenges of designing complex institutional architecture: hospitals, a nanosystems institute, a cancer research centre. His buildings often seem designed not to be photographed from the air but to be used and experienced - from both the inside and out. And he displays the distinctly unstar-like habit of designing structures that respect their neighbours.
One of his recent projects, the Booth School of Business at the University of Chicago, sits across from Frank Lloyd Wright's 1910 Robie House. In a flourish that was widely hailed by critics, Vinoly designed the 415,000 square-foot structure with Prairie Style gestures that echo the smaller landmark instead of visually clobbering it. With NYU Abu Dhabi, Vinoly faced the rather different predicament of planning a campus in relation to a context that was still imaginary. Saadiyat Island, where the school is slated to be built, remains a crowded concept but an empty place. The problem was even more vexing given that John Sexton, the voluble president of NYU, is adamant that the campus on Saadiyat should mirror the famously permeable Manhattan campus in being "in and of the city" (a favourite phrase of Sexton's).
"He has an exploding imagination," said Vinoly, professing great admiration for the university president. "But there is no city!" Vinoly began by deciding which models to reject - beginning with that of the traditional university. "This is the citadel, and there's the door," he said, sketching quickly on a clean piece of notebook paper, "and here's the medieval town, and the poor people are here." Rapidly taking shape on the page was a fortress in squiggles; Vinoly's point was that it looked a lot like Yale. "That's a college campus," he said, resting back in his chair. "These people are out; these people are in. That's exactly what we don't want to do."
Instead, Vinoly has designed NYU Abu Dhabi to sit on what is essentially an artificial hillside that slopes down to meet the city around it ("Like if you were on a hill in Northern Italy"). The city streets lead up to the edge of campus and then merge into pedestrian walkways, which head up the slope diagonally towards three main public plazas and a host of yet-to-be-designed campus buildings. The "hill", meanwhile, is hollow; underneath it is the hugely complicated service infrastructure that supports the university. "You've got to create an artificial topography if you want it to link with the context," he said.
After speaking with a kind of patient, intense focus about NYU for a while, Vinoly returned to voluble form and slalomed through a long course of subjects: Koolhaas's concept of the "generic city" ("Generic my foot! I mean give me a break, right? Did you see his ball with the hole in the centre? What do you call that?"); the oil and gas trade ("Completely medieval, by the way. It's like pepper in the 1500s"); the obvious intelligence of the UAE's founder ("My way of judging people is you just look at their picture"); the insidiousness of contemporary architectural culture ("These are operations that tend to do only one thing, which is to create the sense of fame") and the built environment of China ("I was in China in '83, when it was communist, when there wasn't all this hype. I did three projects in China. The mayor of the city was the head of the transportation union of the People's Republic. And I always thought that was better. I still think it was better. Not because of communism. I think it was physically better. More be - yoo - tiful.")
Ever ambivalent about the role of architect as glamour oracle, Vinoly finished on the subject of Abu Dhabi itself. "If you said today, how would you orient development in a place like this, I think you have to be very daring to imagine that. Because you've got to cool down and say, well, I'm not going to copy this or that, or just look into the international register of star architects and hire them all. Because what do they do?" With that, he picked up the purple ashtray and plunked it down again.
GOLF’S RAHMBO
- 5 wins in 22 months as pro
- Three wins in past 10 starts
- 45 pro starts worldwide: 5 wins, 17 top 5s
- Ranked 551th in world on debut, now No 4 (was No 2 earlier this year)
- 5th player in last 30 years to win 3 European Tour and 2 PGA Tour titles before age 24 (Woods, Garcia, McIlroy, Spieth)
More from Rashmee Roshan Lall
Key figures in the life of the fort
Sheikh Dhiyab bin Isa (ruled 1761-1793) Built Qasr Al Hosn as a watchtower to guard over the only freshwater well on Abu Dhabi island.
Sheikh Shakhbut bin Dhiyab (ruled 1793-1816) Expanded the tower into a small fort and transferred his ruling place of residence from Liwa Oasis to the fort on the island.
Sheikh Tahnoon bin Shakhbut (ruled 1818-1833) Expanded Qasr Al Hosn further as Abu Dhabi grew from a small village of palm huts to a town of more than 5,000 inhabitants.
Sheikh Khalifa bin Shakhbut (ruled 1833-1845) Repaired and fortified the fort.
Sheikh Saeed bin Tahnoon (ruled 1845-1855) Turned Qasr Al Hosn into a strong two-storied structure.
Sheikh Zayed bin Khalifa (ruled 1855-1909) Expanded Qasr Al Hosn further to reflect the emirate's increasing prominence.
Sheikh Shakhbut bin Sultan (ruled 1928-1966) Renovated and enlarged Qasr Al Hosn, adding a decorative arch and two new villas.
Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan (ruled 1966-2004) Moved the royal residence to Al Manhal palace and kept his diwan at Qasr Al Hosn.
Sources: Jayanti Maitra, www.adach.ae
Planes grounded by coronavirus
British Airways: Cancels all direct flights to and from mainland China
Hong Kong-based Cathay Pacific: Cutting capacity to/from mainland China by 50 per cent from Jan. 30
Chicago-based United Airlines: Reducing flights to Beijing, Shanghai, and Hong Kong
Ai Seoul: Suspended all flights to China
Finnair: Suspending flights to Nanjing and Beijing Daxing until the end of March
Indonesia's Lion Air: Suspending all flights to China from February
South Korea's Asiana Airlines, Jeju Air and Jin Air: Suspend all flights
Stage result
1. Pascal Ackermann (GER) Bora-Hansgrohe, in 3:29.09
2. Caleb Ewan (AUS) Lotto-Soudal
3. Rudy Barbier (FRA) Israel Start-Up Nation
4. Dylan Groenewegen (NED) Jumbo-Visma
5. Luka Mezgec (SLO) Mitchelton-Scott
6. Alberto Dainese (ITA) Sunweb
7. Jakub Mareczko (ITA) CCC
8. Max Walscheid (GER) NTT
9. José Rojas (ESP) Movistar
10. Andrea Vendrame (ITA) Ag2r La Mondiale, all at same time
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
A MINECRAFT MOVIE
Director: Jared Hess
Starring: Jack Black, Jennifer Coolidge, Jason Momoa
Rating: 3/5
The specS: 2018 Toyota Camry
Price: base / as tested: Dh91,000 / Dh114,000
Engine: 3.5-litre V6
Gearbox: Eight-speed automatic
Power: 298hp @ 6,600rpm
Torque: 356Nm @ 4,700rpm
Fuel economy, combined: 7.0L / 100km
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The Gentlemen
Director: Guy Ritchie
Stars: Colin Farrell, Hugh Grant
Three out of five stars
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
Thor: Ragnarok
Dir: Taika Waititi
Starring: Chris Hemsworth, Tom Hiddleston, Cate Blanchett, Jeff Goldblum, Mark Ruffalo, Tessa Thompson
Four stars
Key facilities
- Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
- Premier League-standard football pitch
- 400m Olympic running track
- NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
- 600-seat auditorium
- Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
- An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
- Specialist robotics and science laboratories
- AR and VR-enabled learning centres
- Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
BABYLON
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UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
The specs
Engine: 3.0-litre six-cylinder MHEV
Power: 360bhp
Torque: 500Nm
Transmission: eight-speed automatic
Price: from Dh282,870
On sale: now
Sholto Byrnes on Myanmar politics
The Facility’s Versatility
Between the start of the 2020 IPL on September 20, and the end of the Pakistan Super League this coming Thursday, the Zayed Cricket Stadium has had an unprecedented amount of traffic.
Never before has a ground in this country – or perhaps anywhere in the world – had such a volume of major-match cricket.
And yet scoring has remained high, and Abu Dhabi has seen some classic encounters in every format of the game.
October 18, IPL, Kolkata Knight Riders tied with Sunrisers Hyderabad
The two playoff-chasing sides put on 163 apiece, before Kolkata went on to win the Super Over
January 8, ODI, UAE beat Ireland by six wickets
A century by CP Rizwan underpinned one of UAE’s greatest ever wins, as they chased 270 to win with an over to spare
February 6, T10, Northern Warriors beat Delhi Bulls by eight wickets
The final of the T10 was chiefly memorable for a ferocious over of fast bowling from Fidel Edwards to Nicholas Pooran
March 14, Test, Afghanistan beat Zimbabwe by six wickets
Eleven wickets for Rashid Khan, 1,305 runs scored in five days, and a last session finish
June 17, PSL, Islamabad United beat Peshawar Zalmi by 15 runs
Usman Khawaja scored a hundred as Islamabad posted the highest score ever by a Pakistan team in T20 cricket
Ain Dubai in numbers
126: The length in metres of the legs supporting the structure
1 football pitch: The length of each permanent spoke is longer than a professional soccer pitch
16 A380 Airbuses: The equivalent weight of the wheel rim.
9,000 tonnes: The amount of steel used to construct the project.
5 tonnes: The weight of each permanent spoke that is holding the wheel rim in place
192: The amount of cable wires used to create the wheel. They measure a distance of 2,4000km in total, the equivalent of the distance between Dubai and Cairo.
2025 Fifa Club World Cup groups
Group A: Palmeiras, Porto, Al Ahly, Inter Miami.
Group B: Paris Saint-Germain, Atletico Madrid, Botafogo, Seattle.
Group C: Bayern Munich, Auckland City, Boca Juniors, Benfica.
Group D: Flamengo, ES Tunis, Chelsea, (Leon banned).
Group E: River Plate, Urawa, Monterrey, Inter Milan.
Group F: Fluminense, Borussia Dortmund, Ulsan, Mamelodi Sundowns.
Group G: Manchester City, Wydad, Al Ain, Juventus.
Group H: Real Madrid, Al Hilal, Pachuca, Salzburg.
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
The%20Mandalorian%20season%203%20episode%201
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Brief scoreline:
Wales 1
James 5'
Slovakia 0
Man of the Match: Dan James (Wales)