Architecture firm SOM has designed a limestone-clad building patterned with symbolic palm leaves for the Permanent Mission of the United Arab Emirates to the United Nations in Manhattan.
The building represents the United Arab Emirates' (UAE's) diplomacy to the United Nations (UN) and is located in Manhattan's Turtle Bay neighbourhood, close to the UN headquarters.
The building features palm leaf motifs
The Permanent Mission of the United Arab Emirates to the United Nations is an organisation set up by the UAE to champion the UN and is headed by ambassador Lana Zaki Nusseibeh.
Indiana limestone, sourced from the same quarries that provided the facades for the Empire State Building and the Rockefeller Center, clads the diplomacy building.
It is located in Manhattan's Turtle Bay, close to the UN headquarters The 10-storey tower was designed to blend with the scale of the rest of the neighbourhood while also representing the UAE.
SOM added palm leaf motifs to the building's canopy and entrance as an international symbol of peace.
The facade's tapering limestone piers echo narrowing palm leaves
As the tower rises, the facade's vertical elements attenuate to cater to privacy and light-related needs within the building, which also echoes the narrowing spine of a palm leaf.
"The palm is represented by the tapering limestone piers extending skywards from the second floor to the roof," SOM design partner Chris Cooper told Dezeen.
Middle Eastern courtyards informed the buil...