Building a modern-day iconic city

Dubai, once desert is now a major global city with a skyline to rival New York City. The business and cultural hub of the Persian Gulf, it is symbolically known for its skyscrapers, high-rise buildings, and man-made islands. Its vibrant urban landscape, home to the world’s tallest building, has placed Dubai in the forefront of desirable real estate. Now millions of world travelers flock to its vanishing desert sands to gawk at its breath-taking architecture of death-defying constructed proportions while taking advantage of “the shopping capital of the Middle East.” All of this helped transform this once poor fishing village into a playground for celebrities and other affluent travelers. Today, Dubai is fast becoming a modern-day iconic city.

What makes a city iconic? I would argue first the history and culture of a place. I think of Paris and Rome as two such examples. However, architecture also plays a significant role. Taking again my two examples, one cannot think of Paris and not conjure up images of the Eiffel Tower or of Rome and the Coliseum. These two building icons help to define their respective cities by making a statement about their history. Iconic buildings also help to communicate a city’s ambition and its desire to transform itself, such as the case of Dubai becoming a bustling metropolis. To borrow a line from 1989 movie “Field of Dreams,” if you build it, they will come. In order to preserve their economic windfall from the oil boom, Dubai sought to diversify itself through its architecture, sacrificing a bit of its cultural identity in the process. I read somewhere that for a period of time, the government of Dubai banned the construction of its vernacular architecture I assume because it did not support its new image. Vernacular architecture isn’t sexy and keeps the culture rooted in its past. Skyscrapers (and even man-made islands) on the other hand, change our impression of the city into one with labels such as “innovative” and “advanced.”

If we look at New York City, another iconic city, we can see examples of this. Thanks to the economic boom of the early 20^th century, the city saw its skyline rise. Skyscrapers were built to celebrate innovations in building construction with new materials of glass and steel at a time when the tenets of architecture were pushing for modernity. Modernity freed us from the chains of the past and propelled society into a state-of-the art world. In the skyscraper, we found proof that New York was advancing and the city wanted the world to take note. The Lever House is a great example of this. A British soap company chose the city to be its US headquarters and commissioned the building of a skyscraper to house it. And more came. Today, New York City is identified as one of the three command centers for the world economy. It a hub for worldwide trendsetting art and fashion and is one of the most expensive places to own (or rent) real estate. Coincidentally, Dubai shares some of the same characteristics. Can it someday become “New York City” iconic?