Qanat Quartier is the canal district at the heart of The Pearl-Qatar island, modelled on Mediterranean waterfront towns — Venice and Portofino are the obvious references — with pastel-coloured apartment buildings, narrow water channels, and a boardwalk lined with restaurants and cafés. It is unapologetically artificial and makes no pretence of being anything else.
Within those terms, the Qanat Quartier is well executed: the buildings are varied, the canals are genuine water channels navigable by small boats, and the scale — unlike most Gulf developments — is human rather than monumental. On a cooler evening with the restaurants open and families walking the boardwalk, it is a pleasant place to spend a couple of hours.