Zood Real Estate

Office & retail

Programme: Office & retail
Location: Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
Practice: Axio Architects
My contribution: Facade design
Project credits: Planning by the senior architect at the practice.

Zood office and retail towers with stone-clad vertical elements and curved glazed corners

The idea

Najdi rooflines, narrow passages and stepped bases inform the facade concept for these two office towers. Stone-clad vertical elements and rounded glazed corners give the current facade a shared language, while a planted retail podium brings the composition down to street level. My contribution focused on facade design, with planning developed by the senior architect at the practice.

01 / Design study

Site & context

A corner site in Riyadh brings the office towers and retail podium into contact with a varied urban edge. The context study establishes the surrounding streets, neighbouring buildings and access points.

The 3,600 m² corner plot and its surrounding streets

02 / Design study

Form development

Nine project-development studies trace the site, setbacks and tower arrangement through to the shared podium and planted terraces.

A 3,600 m² plot within the surrounding street grid establishes the starting point for two office towers.

01 / 09

03 / Design study

Najdi references

The facade study draws from the irregular endings of traditional Najdi walls, the close grain of narrow streets and the depth of recessed entrances. These references inform the tower crowns, the space between the volumes and the stepped podium.

Roofscape, passages and podium articulation — references from the project concept presentation

04 / Design study

Tower proportions

Two illustrative views isolate the massing, rounded corners and relationship of the towers to their shared base.

Concept silhouette — the relationship between the two tower heights

Concept silhouette — the towers and shared base from an oblique view

05 / Design study

Concept-stage facade studies

Selected concept-stage visualisations explore stonework, terrace edges and the entrance at street level. These show a different facade iteration from the current scheme presented in the opening image and final views.