Rem Koolhaas's Dubai Deathstar

We show a lot of proposals for buildings in Dubai, often draped in photovoltaics and covered in propellers, or twisting and turning, it is a Disneyland of architecture. Sometimes we think they are going a bit overboard, as they evolve from Disney to Lucas with buildings like OMA's Ras al Khaimah Convention and Exhibition Centre. We have used Picasso's bon mot, updated by Le Corbusier before: "Good architects borrow but great architects steal" but never was the homage so obvious. Architectspeak below the fold.

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So far the 21st century – in a desperate effort to differentiate one building from the next – has been characterized by a manic production of extravagant shapes. Paradoxically, the result is a surprisingly monotonous urban substance, where any attempt at ‘difference’ is instantly neutralized in a sea of meaningless architectural gestures.

RAK is confronted with an important choice: Does it join so many others in this mad, futile race or does it become the first to offer a new credibility?

This project represents a final attempt at distinction through architecture:not through the creation of the next bizarre image, but through a return to pure form. ::OMA via my favourite source for wild and crazy architecture, ::Myninjaplease

Note: gravestmor suggests that it is not modelled on the deathstar, but on a Panasonic radio from 1972, five years before the first Star Wars movie, calling it "the little Japanese radio that could."