Aldar Headquarters

A 121 m-tall glass disc on the south-eastern edge of Yas Island, designed by MZ Architects and immediately identifiable from the highway approach into Abu Dhabi from the airport. Two convex glass facades meet at a perfectly circular vertical edge, the only one of its kind in the region.

The building is corporate and not open to visitors, but worth a slowdown if you are driving past. Floodlit at night in colours that change with the season.

things to do sight architecture
A story
The 23-storey perfect circle of the Aldar HQ is the first circular skyscraper in the Middle East. Completed in 2010, it has been likened to a coin standing on its edge — an apt metaphor for the property-developer that built it.