BUILDING DREAMS NOW

Buildings are concrete, regardless of what materials were used to build them. They are substantial and definite. Yet we found architects and artists who create buildings and spaces that seem more like dreams.

1. DAME ZAHA HADID DBE

Dame Zaha Hadid DBE, is one of the most respected and lauded archi­tects of our time, known for her modern, mind-bending, dream-like designs.

She is first woman to win the Pritzker Prize for Architecture in its 26 year history. She consistently pushes the boundaries of architecture and urban design to the realm of fantasy, then makes the impossible-dream buildings come alive --  for real.

Hadid experiments with new spatial concepts, both as exterior structures and interior spaces, to create what she calls “a new fluid kind of spatiality.” In many ways, the multiple perspective points and fragmented geometries are what we experience in dreams.

Her latest designs include the spectacular Opus Office Tower and Opera House  in Dubai, and a revolutionary Superyacht.

Opus is a surrealist wonder that includes a luxury hotel, offices, retail outlets, apartments, and a unique cafe. 

Developed as two individual structures, it forms as a single warped cube, which seems like it hovers above the ground. At its center is a fluid void, letting reality shine through in different views in daylight and lit up at night. And a rift in the solid walls gives glimpses a flux state.

Hadid worked her dreamy design concepts inside and out of this amazing building, including all of its furniture.

The three-tiered Vertical Cafe looks like a majestic metal lotus flower that soars through the south entrance's main atrium. Small glass orbs are suspended, like an asteroid belt. Seems like a dream… it could hypnotise.

Opus Tower is scheduled to open in 2016. Already it is an icon of archi­tec­tural dis­tinc­tion in down­town Dubai.

The Unique Circle Yachts, by Zaha Hadid Architects for Blohm+Voss, includes a family of five individual 90m yachts that look and ride like a sea-dream. Fluid dynamics and underwater ecosystems inspired and informed this design, as if Leviathan were swimming inside Hadid’s head.

This isn’t your regular sugar-daddy’s yacht. No traditional horizontal order or pomp happening here. Instead, the exoskeleton creates new physical and conceptual connections between the various levels and aspects of the boat. Hydrodynamic research informed the design of the hull.

2. JEEYOUNG LEE

Southern Korean artist JeeYoung Lee, creates dreams in her studio, by turning its space into a landscape of the subconscious mind, using an amalgamation of the beautiful and surreal.

Lee photographs each studio scene once it is completed. In one scene, the subject is cast adrift on a strange sea of papier mache tongues. In another, paper clips take aim. Everyday objects take on an otherworldly purpose.

As dreams are a process our brains use to work out a comprehension of real events that our conscious brains might not be able to grasp, Lee’s pieces work out the concerns and process of growing up.