Riyadh Gateway

Name Riyadh Gateway
Client Riyadh Art + Royal Commission for Riyadh City
Location Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
Year 2021

The Riyadh Welcoming Gateways competition design draws on the diversity of the site’s culture and ecology. The gateway stands as a series of arches across the highway at the southern entrance to Riyadh, as the threshold to the wadi and the city beyond.

As one drives through the gateway, a simple arch fractures into a weightless vault, defined by 15 individual gates. Each vault is formed by a repeated geometry inspired by the Globe Thistle, a plant local to the region.

TZG worked in collaboration with Saudi artist Dana Awartani to map patterns across a three dimensional array of tri-diminished icosahedrons. The process involved utilizing parametric modelling software and advanced visualisation techniques.

Awartani’s practice unearths the significance of built heritage in creating a shared experience and shaping notions of identity. This overlap in interest between Awartani and TZG fostered a rich and meaningful response to the locality, heritage and typology.

Team

Peter Tonkin, Wolfgang Ripberger, Rowan Lear.

Collaborators

Dana Awartani, Urban Art Projects, TCL.

Previous Project:
Temora Flying School

Next Project:
Newcastle East End

Riyadh Gateway

As one drives through the gateway, a simple arch fractures into a weightless vault, defined by 15 individual gates. Each vault is formed by a repeated geometry inspired by the Globe Thistle, a plant local to the region.

TZG worked in collaboration with Saudi artist Dana Awartani to map patterns across a three dimensional array of tri-diminished icosahedrons. The process involved utilizing parametric modelling software and advanced visualisation techniques.

Awartani’s practice unearths the significance of built heritage in creating a shared experience and shaping notions of identity. This overlap in interest between Awartani and TZG fostered a rich and meaningful response to the locality, heritage and typology.

Related projects

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Craigieburn Bypass

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TZG acknowledges the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander People, on whose land we work and pay our respects to Elders past, present and future. We are committed to a just, equitable and reconciled Australia and support the Uluru Statement from the Heart. Always was, always will be.

TZG acknowledges the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander People, on whose land we work and pay our respects to Elders past, present and future. We are committed to a just, equitable and reconciled Australia and support the Uluru Statement from the Heart.

Always was, always will be.