The Yas Hotel in Dubai's sister Emirate, Abu Dhabi, has earned the impressive (though weirdly categorized) title of the world's largest LED project, which, given that it's comprised of about 5,300 steel panels adorned with over 5000 lighting fixtures, I don't doubt it for a second. The lighting grid can change colors and display patterns, and, though it's a stretch, play low-res video.

Underneath this curvilinear shell is a typically extravagant 500-room hotel, which, bizarrely, is divided by a Formula 1 race track, meaning that this egregious phallic symbol is regularly entered and exited by other compensatory phallic symbols, raced in competition to win yet more phallic symbols, which is a bit too much for me to process, now or ever. [Inhabitat via Flavorwire]

The Dubai Fountain—which was recently finished by the Burj Dubai—can reach 492 feet up in the air.

It was built for $217 million by WET Design, which is the same company that created the one at the Bellagio Hotel, in Las Vegas. The 900-foot long water show uses 6,600 lights, 50 colored projectors, and hundreds of servos, all computer controlled and synchronized with music to offer some of the most sophisticated water entertainment since Zeus decided to impregnate Danaë. [Wikipedia and Dark Roasted Blend]

Granted, the resemblance to Spaceship Earth might be unavoidable when the Technosphere is meant to represent the state of Earth's ecosystem, now and in the future. But considering that everything in the building will be solar-powered with minimal waste due to water recycling, it's definitely a few steps ahead of the real thing though. [WAN]

With the walls constructed of dark, solar protected glass, the abundant plant life of this Villamoda Galleries design is clearly visible at the right angles and the neatly kept vertical gardens appear as if they're part of the hotel's very structure and are a stunning blend of nature and architecture. I just wish there were some vines to swing around from. [WAN]

Designed as a residential, hotel and entertainment facility, the Vertical Village is absolutely blanketed in solar panels. In fact, the building is expected to earn a LEED Gold certification when it is completed. That distinction is difficult enough for a homeowner to obtain, much less a gigantic commercial structure. Each building is oriented to reduce the heat from sun exposure—quite the contrary to a massive bed of solar collectors on the south side of the building that automatically adjusts to the sun's position for maximum efficiency. The village also features a solar roof that helps to transport energy and break the solar field up into more manageable segments.

It's not enough to have all of the really cool buildings on the planet—now they want a monopoly on the sun. Damn you Dubai. [Graftlab via Ecofriend via Inhabitat]

Yep, pretty big. [Kottke]

For some reason, some production company thought it would be nice to promote themselves using an annoying fake trailer depicting a futuristic version of Dubai. I don't care. I just like the coruscantbladerunnery of it all. I wish they included the one kilometer-high Nakheel Tower, though. [Dubai Metro via Dvice]

Called al hakawati (the storyteller), the naked Dr. Manhattan/Jolly Green Giant monolith will ironically contain a children's library in the feet, some elevators, and will—get this—move as it recites stories to passers-by.

Special joints in the arms and neck will ensure the people lounging around inside don't notice the movement, and that the elevators work properly. The gaudy "Gold Room" (looks like a discotheque to me, hit the link) will take up most of the head, with the eyes serving as view ports.

Dubai has outdone itself again.

Updated: Yes, this appears to be a contest entry, and could be built someday. But it's Dubai, so I remain convinced this will stand tall near the Burj al Arab. [Design Boom via Design Blog]

The plane, dubbed Alpha Bravo, was slated to be shown off at Heathrow but now, according to British papers, it may be "cut into pieces" and sent to Dubai. Six of the planes are already in museums, and this puppy isn't fit for flight anyway, as it wasn't given the safety upgrade that the others got after that 2000 Paris crash.

Still, some people are sad to think of the last of the skinny-but-mighty supersonic passenger jets sitting on top of a cruiseliner with its wings literally clipped. [Telegraph UK]

In a tragic turn of events, the superyacht (called, boringly, the Dubai) was originally commissioned by Prince Jefri of Brunei—oh how the wheel of conspicuous consumption is always turning!

It features eight decks spread across 551 feet of length, accommodations for 115 people, and all of the expected restaurants, bars, private whole-deck owners' suites, helipad, pool, Jacuzzi, woefully tacky interior...need I continue?

The folks at Luxist point out though that the Dubai's title as the world's largest is in danger—Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich, the owner of the Chelsea football club, is planning a 555-ft yacht. [Luxist, Superyacht Times]

From a news report on Deutsche Welle TV, this clips give us a glimpse of the hard times hitting Dubai, where some construction crews have halted projects in light of the fact that "there isn't a [Real Estate] market at all," according to one Dubai Realtor.

Indeed, some shots appear almost post-apocalyptic in nature, with endless towers of gleaming metal and glass standing silently with no one around to smudge them up. [via Treehugger]

The small beach will protect guests' precious feet by piping cold air through a series of tubes underneath the sand, which will suck enough heat from the blistering surface to offset the beaming sun and 110F temperatures. A system of computers and thermostats will monitor and adjust the system.

Hotel proprietor Soheil Abedian, who holds the uniquely Dubaian job title of "Guy Who Takes Wild Guesses at What Very Rich People Might Pay For", had this to say about his project:

We will suck the heat out of the sand to keep it cool enough to lie on. This is the kind of luxury that top people want.

Top people! I can only assume that this means the hotel's patronage will be strictly limited to previous winners of Top Chef and/or America's Next Top Model. The hotel is set to open next year, or possible in early 2010. [Daily Mail]

Oh, wow. Apparently, in May, a Brit and a Frenchman snuck on to the under-construction Burj Dubai and BASE jumped from it at 650 meters up. Now, there's video available of their infiltration, jump and subsequent escape. The footage from up top and the jump is just incredible stuff. I wish I had the cajones to do something like this. Although my favorite part of the video may be the footnote at the end; wait for it, it's worth it. [Current via Neatorama]

[The Big Picture]

The defining element of the Anara Tower has got to be the massive propeller-like structure at the very top, at the center of which will be a glass-ceiling hub containing one of the world's most luxe restaurants. Unfortunately, the propeller doesn't rotate, but I guess we'll let that slide.

In the tower itself there will be 300 insanely-expensive apartments, a 250-room luxury hotel and gardens every 27 floors. Places that the slaves building it won't be enjoying. Construction is due to start by the end of next year assuming that their real estate and financial services don't go to hell with the rest of the world. [Urbanity via Dvice]

Aesthetically, I still like Beijing's terminal more than Dubai's, but with 82 moving walkways, 97 escalators, eight skytrains, 82 moving, 157 lifts, and designed to easily handle the Airbus A380 and probably aircraft-carrier-sized UFOs, I've to admit it looks mighty impressive.

No slaves were harm in the making of this gigantic building. OK, maybe a few were injured here and there. More images at [Explorer]

If completed, the Dubai City Tower, would definitely be absolutely breathtaking. I wonder how many slaves would have to die to complete this one. [Luxury Property via Dark Roasted Blend]

All of these men are part of a huge scam that is helping the construction boom in the Gulf. Like hundreds of thousands of migrant workers, they each paid more than £1,000 to employment agents in India and Pakistan. They were promised double the wages they are actually getting, plus plane tickets to visit their families once a year, but none of the men in the room had actually read their contract. Only two of them knew how to read.

Once they arrive in the United Arab Emirates, migrant workers are treated little better than cattle, with no access to healthcare and many other basic rights. The company that sponsors them holds on to their passports - and often a month or two of their wages to make sure that they keep working. And for this some will earn just 400 dirhams (£62) a month.

You can read his complete article at The Guardian site. [The Guardian]

But maybe the most interesting aspect of the mega sign is not its size but its practicality. Workers within the building will not become pale-skinned cave dwellers as the display promises not to obstruct the flow of natural light.

Still, just to be safe, we'd probably opt for our office space to be on the other "less impressive" side of the building. [Gulf News]

According to Nakheel CEO Christopher O'Donnell, "from our perspective, we are building a tower that's going to be over a kilometre in height. This is a complete iconic development. It may be the tallest." We will have to wait ten years to see if it is actually the tallest. Nakheel says that this is part of a huge complex that will have 40 towers, ranging from 20 to 90 floors each. [Daily Telegraph]

Before you just write this off as another wacky internet design concept, consider the absurdly ostentatious structures that Dubai has already built, and the fact that unlike the hyperluxurious ego-boosters currently under construction, the Ziggurat might be a viable housing solution for people who don't have a natural resource-infused trust fund. [World Architecture Review via Inhabitat via Dvice]

Absolutely crazy. [Thanks David!]

At 825 feet long, the unnamed fountain will be 25% larger than the Bellagio fountain. Powering the fountain will be pumps capable of shooting columns of water approximately 450 or so feet into the dry Middle Eastern air. A light and sound show produced by a network of 6,600 lights and 50 projectors will illuminate the burgeoning Dubai skyline at night. About 22,000 gallons of water are expected to cycle through the fountain at any given time when it is completed in 2009. Now, if you'll excuse me, nature calls. [Luxury Launches]

Fisher was inspired to design the Dynamic Tower during a visit to a friend's top-floor Midtown Manhattan apartment. "I had a view of the Hudson River and East River at the same time, it was beautiful and I wanted to make that feeling accessible to more people." He loves the idea of seeing the sun rise and set in the same room, and considers the building to be four-dimensional. "Time is always changing the shape of the building," he told me.

The rotation takes up to 3 hours (so you're not always spilling your coffee), and gets power from photovoltaic solar cells and 79 wind turbines, one located between each floor. The system is meant to create enough energy to power to the entire tower and still have juice to spare for some surrounding buildings. According to Fisher, two of these $700 million futuristic scrapers are planned so far, one each in Dubai and Moscow. They will be built using a truly radical technique.

Construction on the Dynamic Tower will be unlike anything that preceded it. The only part of the tower built on site will be the skinny center core. It is strong enough to hold the floors in place, and will contain the building's elevators, which transport people and cars right to their door. Each floor will be made piece by piece in a factory in Italy—a throwback to Fisher's previous life in prefabricated bathroom design—and placed onto the core using a lift system. With this method, each story is completed in about six days. By comparison, traditional ground-up methods can take six weeks per floor.

Groundbreaking for Dynamic Towers in Dubai and Moscow is expected to happen in the fall, with construction reaching completion by the end of 2010. If you're game—and very, very loaded—you can sign up now for a villa or office space. The going rate is $3000/sq foot. [Dynamic Architecture]

Their ambitions don’t stop at snow; Riverhead also has a water park, botanical gardens, hotels, convention halls and various other resort mainstays slated for construction around the slopes. It’ll also fill a neighboring, yet-to-be-built suburb for resort employees and people who are really, really enthusiastic about indoor skiing but can’t afford a move to Dubai.

Riverhead plans to build the resort complex on property that now holds a long-disused Cold War naval facility, so the plans wouldn’t be displacing residents or destroying small towns. The primary opposition to the project is based on environmental concerns. Detractors argue that the construction project will destroy the ecosystem on this peaceful area of Long Island, which given the ridiculous scale of construction seems totally certain. Seriously though, have they seen the proposal? They’re building a mountain! It’s hard not to appreciate that. Optimistic projections are for opening in a decade but you can have a look at Riverhead Resorts' whole sales pitch below.

[MSNBC]

Thanks to its lightweight frame and complex gear system, the Naturmobil can can reach speeds of around 50 mph when the horse is really hauling. However, the cruising speed generally tops out at a more leisurely 12 mph. Mirhejazi hopes to parade his invention throughout the world in an attempt to secure financing for a second generation 4 horsepower Naturmobile that he plans to use for tourist transportation. Oh, how the mighty have fallen. [Xpress via Neatorama via DVICE]

You see, in order to offer every first-class passenger a shower, the airline will have to add one metric tonne of water to its payload, dragging a carbon cost of around 50,000 lbs. per trip.

All part of the luxury experience, right? No one has seen photos of the upcoming A380 first-class cabin, but it is allegedly something on par with the "seven star" Burj Al Arab hotel in Dubai, and that it makes Singapore Airlines' front end—with double beds and dining "environments"—look like a dog's backend.

Sure, an in-air shower might negatively impact the earth in catastrophic and irreversible ways, but think about it this way: the only people who will make use of it come from oil wealth, so they probably wouldn't give a shit to begin with! [Times UK via Luxurylaunches]

The island will be divided into 25 identical blocks, which will be populated by a mix of tall and squat towers punctuated by more fantastic buildings, like a spiraling 82-story tower, and a 44-story sphere (trendy now, no?) that will be its own mini-city within a mini-city complete with a sprawling network of escalator tubes (pictured in the gallery). There's also traditional parks and stuff inside to keep it a little more earthly, but every new gargantuan development like this makes us wonder just how far Dubai will push it next. [NYT via io9]

Imagine a tower whose unique spiralling design reflects the boundless energies and ever-changing shapes of the deserts, winds and seas that surround it.

I think that the Infinity Tower reflects the boundless money and ever-burgeoning profits of foreign contractors as they reap the seemingly never-ending petro-dollars of Dubai and its neighbors' ruling families. Hot dang, there goes my invite to the opening of the Burj Dubai. [Infinity Tower]

The robots will also be capable of interacting with guests by following them with their eyes or lunging at them as the walk by. Even though you would think that keeping the wraps on a 500,000 square foot park would be difficult, further details are scarce. However, the park is scheduled to open in late 2008 in City of Arabia, Dubai. [City of Arabia and Cosmos]