The Souk was selected as the winner for 2019 Dubai Design Week Installation program. It remains un-built so far due to logistical and scheduling conflicts that cropped up due to the tight time frame left after the competition.

The Souk is a cluster of three identical pods, straddling between an installation as a construct, and a space, as it purportedly creates a smaller version of the ubiquitous, Middle Eastern bazaar; an urban microcosm, where the network of people and commerce create the unique urban character. 'The Souk' takes its inspiration from this, and tries to re-interpret it in the temporary setting of the exhibition. At the urban scale, the Cluster would act like a node, with its unique design and the micro-urban space. At the cluster level, the pavilions offer 3 focus areas of interaction and a public square trapped in between the cluster.  

The geometry of the pavilion is derived from the most common element, seen widely, in some of the most popular Islamic murals / patterns that adore some of the iconic architecture in the Islamic world- The Decagon.

The Souk transforms the two dimensional Decagon into a seemingly complex, but, easy to build, three-dimensional construct. The decagons have been layered vertically to create a dynamic space, which showcases the structural, material and the poetic possibilities in timber and the sophisticated detailing of structural joinery in architectural timber. The pavilion is completely pre-fabricated and assembled at site over a period of two days. 

Team:
Architect: Collaborative Architecture
Client: Dubai design week 
Design Team: Lalita Tharani, Mujib Ahmed, Prasidh, Naufan Naseer 
Structure: Web Structure 
Lighting: Bo Steiber Lighting Design