All Civic + Cultural Umm Al Emarat Park

Umm Al Emarat Park

Umm Al Emarat (Mother of the Nation) Park is an exciting redevelopment of a public park featuring a variety of amenities, educational spaces and botanic gardens in the heart of Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates. The design of the new park [honors] the legacy of the late Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan and his vision of preserving the United Arab Emirates’ cultural and natural history.

Location

Abu Dhabi, UAE

Completed

2015

Client

Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan

Landscape Architect

BrightView Design Group

Awards

2018 Graphis Design Annual, Merit Award

2015 HOW International Design Awards, Award of Merit

2015 GDUSA American Graphic Design Award

2015 ASLA Colorado Design Award, Merit Award

This project aims to enrich its guests through exciting features that can be found throughout the park and to provide them with a safe community space where families can explore, relax and spend time together. ArtHouse Design has created a comprehensive, bilingual signage and wayfinding program for this beautiful new development that was inspired by the local culture, flora and fauna of the United Arab Emirates, and the goals of the park and surrounding community. This included custom icons to delineate each amenity and area of discovery throughout the park, decorative banners, city bus wraps to advertise the park throughout Abu Dhabi, and a custom map for ease of navigation.

ArtHouse also developed beautiful, interactive exhibit designs for the petting zoo, Hajar Mountains installation and several other educational displays, as well as interactive, glowing seating that contributes to Mother of the Nation Park’s unique sense of place. ArtHouse extended its use of placemaking to a monumental entry pavilion that is decorated with hundreds of glass panels etched with an elegant and ethereal custom tree design, as well as sand-blasted pavers and bronze-cast fish sculptures that form a central feature throughout the park. ArtHouse created a truly innovative environment that is a graceful marriage of Emirati heritage and pioneering design and will surely be a community fixture for many years to come.

ArtHouse Design won a 2015 GDUSA American Graphic Design Awards Award of Recognition, a 2015 HOW International Design Awards Award of Merit,as well as a Merit Award in the 2018 Graphis Design Annual for its designs for Mother of the Nation Park’s environmental graphics, signage, exhibits, public art & wayfinding. The team that worked on Mother of the Nation Park also won a 2015 American Society of Landscape Architects (Colorado chapter) Merit Award for the design of this project.