Wadi Rum Resort by Oppenheim

Project: Wadi Rum Resort
Designed by Oppenheim
Location: Wadi Rum, Jordan
Website: oppenoffice.com
Oppenheim is no stranger to developing projects on a challenging location, perhaps the real challenge here was to blur the line between nature and  man-made and design an outstanding 80,000 sqf hotel in Wadi Rum. The project is set to become reality by the year 2014.

Here, where desert sand meets desert stone, we see a singular opportunity to devise a new contract between man and nature. Reinterpeting the way we have dealt with the earth, our proposal establishes a new benchmark for design, quality and sustainability in the natural environment. To live in harmony with the natural world, we must learn how to re-engage the land. Earnest and timeless, the architecture is simlutaneously powerful, yet comfortable, primitive, yet innovative, casual, yet elegant, raw, yet refined. The built from merges silently with its wondrous setting, exploiting and enhancing the natural beauty of the site to establish luxury lodge accommodations – that are uniquely beautiful and luxurious. The resulting ancient connection with the universe through simple, elemental forms, sincere materiality, and the use of bountiful natural resources both physical and ethereal. Nature accelerated, enhanced and embrace, nature nurtured.

The architecture we will humbly create within the realm of the Wadi is intended to miraculously and meticulously add another sound in a perfect symphony, another ingredient in a perfect dish. The conceptual point of departure has its roots in the tectonic and geological histories of the region. Through an engagement of the existing natural faults and fissures, the architecture is inserted in the landscape with nominal impact and primal elegance – synchronizing with the topography. Symbiotically and sensitively attuned to the rhythms of the area – a responsible stewardship of the environment. The boundaries between man made and nature, interior and exterior are deliberately blurred establishing maximum effect with minimum effect. The lodges are nestled across the landscape, enhancing rather than distorting an awareness of the context. An enlightened new approach to living with the land and not simply upon it. Simplicity and functionality are inherent to the entire design, so that nothing distracts the eye. The lodges and villas in their various incarnations.