This project was designed and constructed as a 300 sqm temporary exhibition space that responds to the theme Storytelling Between the Lines, for the 4th iteration of Abwab at Dubai Design Week in 2018.

The project provides an active public space and hosts five exhibitions. This construction explores the architectural potential of an environmentally-friendly material system that integrates locally sourced and scavenged of palm fronds with sprayable and fibrous materials, specifically, paper pulp made from locally reclaimed newspapers. Thus, the project invites the visitors to ask questions about the role of material and cultural construction at a time of climate change crisis.

The overall project is comprised of a series of five differentiated spaces defined by textured wall surfaces constructed through the layering of natural and synthetic materials to create an almost natural condition. Thus, overlap between natural and synthetic materials, as well as the repurposing material that is typically outside of mainstream consturction supply chains challenge the visitors’ assumptions about material, structure and construction.

The textures recede on the interior of every individual space, to allow for the exhibited material to take center stage. Ultimately, the dynamic composition and the relationship between each of the five spaces and the narratives they host defines an activated public space, where an overall common narrative emerges, highlighting the similarities of all the exhibited narratives despite their unique points of view and material expressions.

After the event, all elements of the project have been composted or recycled.