identity 215: A Serene Escape

That restraint is harder than opulence. identity opens by noting that LW went “against the grain” to create an understated, minimalist property in a city known for the opposite, and that the simplicity is what makes the materiality, the architectural forms and the intimacy legible at all. The practice does not present this as an easy position.

A journey through volumes. The triple-height lobby is grounded by a chandelier under the arched ceiling; the central spiral staircase that every EDITION has is here covered in Venetian plaster and revealed as a triple-height cascade. The lighting, designed with Isometrix, is focused at eye level and dimmed further at night with candlelight, which identity reads as deliberately cocooning. In Duomo, projectors set into the walls map Onion Lab’s digital artwork onto the domed surface — the magazine records this as a first for the brand.

The 275 rooms across six categories share one material palette of light oak and stone accents, with the veins in the natural stone and the wood matched piece by piece so the banding does not repeat. The rooms carry no artwork except a single piece by Carolle Bénitah, inspired by the Dubai Fountains.