A spiraling new supertower hopes to grace one of Tanzania’s most spectacular coastal islands thanks to an ambitious, albeit repurposed design from Dubai-based firm xcassia.
Taking its design from a set of dominoes, the proposed 70-story tower will inhabit a manmade island on the Zanzibar archipelago 100 miles away from the capital Dars es Salaam.
Once completed, the scheme could become the second-largest tower on the African continent as well as the first skyscraper to be built on a manmade island outside of Dubai.
Made up of 360 individual component “keys,” the 1.2-million-square-foot Zanzibar Domino Commercial Tower will play host to Africa's largest luxury hotel topped in addition to 500 residential units by an observation deck that offers visitors views of the surrounding Indian Ocean.
According to the architect: “I dreamed of building this project for over a decade. Between its innate mathematical order and geometries found in nature, its pure lines and proportions that evoke growth, progress and freedom, it had all the bearings of an icon anyone could remember and draw on a paper napkin. All it lacked was the right visionary investor and site to make it come true.”
An earlier version of the design had been planned for an artificial island off the cave-laden coast of northern Vietnam. Plans for the original tower were scrapped, however, owing to a host of concerns that the architect says were exacerbated by the pandemic, though its social media popularity did eventually draw the attention of developers AICL Group, who were quick to tap xcassia for the 50-acre development project.
Zanzibar is home to many rare and endangered species as well as a unique, lime-washed stone architecture in addition to being a prominent cog in the spice trade, which constitutes the archipelago’s main export.
Construction is expected to take four years once the proposed project commences.
7 Comments
I though Dodoma was the capital of Tanzania? circa 1974
Building that off Zanzibar will be an interesting challenge indeed. Keep us updated if it proceeds.
I'm sure it's lost on no one, the use of dominoes as a typology for such a speculative piece. Nothing bad will come of this, nothing....
Building such a gigantic structure on a man-made island is absolutely brilliant because there have never been any problems building on fill.
Only as long as the fill is 75% peat and 25% bark chips.
Somehow can tell it’s done by a Dubai firm with eyes closed.
A press release from an architect trying to drum up attention to its business - the more obnoxious the render the better.
Why use more notes when one is enough to ruin it?
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