The location for this villa faces the waterways of a Colin Montgomerie golf course, within the exclusive Emirates Hills gated community in Dubai. The Client, an industrialist with global operations, purchased the 1500 sqm site for his immediate and extended family, and requested the design conform to Vaastu, a traditional Hindu belief system based on directional alignments used originally in temple development. Vaastu thus became the driving force in the spatial planning of both site and building.

The layout of the villa was planned around a three-by-three grid of which the centre was left vacant to create a passive open space. Activities were then distributed around this central courtyard, with both public and private zones discretely accessible.

The aesthetic form was driven by a contemporary take on the traditional Arabic home that is as much about adapting to the extreme heat, as it is about material context and suitability. The forms evolved in a simple modern language of solid mass with carved out voids, internalising the central court. The design then adapted the traditional internal and external gardens by allowing their interconnection through a substantial living space that can be closed off. The gardens expand and contract depending on the climatic conditions and and the Client’s need for further intimacy when required.

This altering of spaces according to the Client’s needs was taken from the intellectual idea of the veil – to see but not be seen – and is a gesture to Arabic hospitality. The physical manifestation of this idea is exemplified in the primary form – an expansive mashrabia of timber latticework – facing the street. Not only does this modern take on the traditional dissipate the western sun, it allows for the unveiling of the building’s interior to those invited in.