Challenging the laws of gravity: The creation of Dubai’s Museum of the Future

By the time it opened its doors in February 2022, Dubai’s Museum of the Future had already captured the hearts of the city. For six years, both locals and tourists had been captivated by the mesmerizing, silver structure slowly rising along Sheikh Zayed Road, Dubai’s bustling main highway.

The building's distinctive design started to come alive when the intricately detailed, calligraphy-adorned metal plates were added. As they were fixed into place, workers would rappel down the sloping surfaces each day, drawing crowds and endless selfies, leaving everyone intrigued by their exact task.

Upon its completion, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Dubai's ruler, hailed the 77-meter-high stainless steel torus as 'the most beautiful building in the world,' while Architectural Digest called it 'an instant, Instagram-ready icon.'

It's yet another standout achievement for Dubai, marking a leap in architectural innovation, a structure that’s not just ahead of its time, but light years beyond anything the city—or the world—has seen before.

The known future, and the unknown future

While most museums showcase the past or the present, what exactly does a museum of the future hold?

"Each floor of the museum explores a different facet of the future—healthcare, transportation, aviation, smart cities, government services, space exploration, and more," says Shaun Killa, design partner at Dubai’s Killa Design, the architectural firm behind the project. "It’s the future as we envision it for the next couple of years, perhaps the next two to three."

The museum sits atop a green mound, symbolizing Earth, with the central structure representing humanity. The void at its core, however, symbolizes the unknown aspects of the future—what we have yet to discover.

"The people who venture into the unknown are those who innovate and make discoveries," Killa explains. "These pioneers will continuously reshape the museum over time, ensuring its relevance as the unknown evolves. The void represents that—our understanding of the future, juxtaposed with everything that is still to come."

It’s deep and existential.

In practical terms, this vision manifests as a series of immersive experiences that transport visitors into a glimpse of the near future.

In the vast lobby, a penguin-shaped drone glides through the air, accompanied by a futuristic symphony of bleeps and bloops. An elevator, resembling a spacecraft with screens as windows, whisks visitors on a four-minute journey to the OSS Hope space station, 600 kilometers above Earth and 50 years ahead of our time.

The museum also features a library of 4,500 animal DNA codes that can be 'collected' on smart devices. The future tech zone evokes the eerie, dystopian vibe of 'Black Mirror,' showcasing everything from the unnerving CyberDog to under-skin payment chips, virus-resistant clothing, and a falcon-shaped robot engineered to manage real bird populations.

Yet the true allure lies in the space itself and the museum's instantly recognizable form. 'It had to be futuristic, with a sense of direction,' says Killa. 'A perfect oval would have felt stagnant.' The torus shape and its off-center void convey a sense of constant motion. 'It gives the impression that it’s always evolving. The future never stops, and you’ve got to keep pace with it.'

A glimpse into the future

The Arabic calligraphy adorning the building serves not only as decoration but as windows into the future. Created by Emirati artist Mattar Bin Lahej, the script is based on three inspiring quotes from Sheikh Mohammed, the most renowned being, 'The future belongs to those who can imagine it, design it, and execute it. It isn’t something you wait for, but something you create.'

Written in the classical Thuluth Arabic script, the calligraphy was initially hand-sketched by Bin Lahej, who views the museum not just as a building, but as 'a work of art.' However, adapting the script to the torus shape proved difficult. 'The challenge was how to incorporate the three quotes onto a building that has no corners, with an oval structure that rises and falls,' he explains.

This posed a significant challenge for Killa and his team. 'It took us four and a half months to figure out how to take something flat and apply it to a parametrically designed building with no 'surface'—just sweeping arcs,' says Killa. The solution came through filmmaking software, 'the kind used to put fur on dinosaurs,' as Killa describes. The team 'broke' the building into segments, simulating a non-continuous surface by 'removing' the top.

'What is this? I don’t get it.'

The final design for the Museum of the Future was chosen from a collection of submissions during a six-week competition.

Three weeks into the process, with sketches scattered across his dining table, Killa hit a wall. 'I looked at them all and thought, none of these are good enough. None of them align with Sheikh Mohammed’s vision, and none of them feel like they could win,' he recalls.

By the fourth week, he was still unsatisfied. 'I put on some inspiring music and just sat with it all. Then, around 1 a.m., I sketched something that clicked. I knew instantly that it was the right direction. So, I took a picture, sent it to the 3D modeler on WhatsApp, thought 'that’s it, my job’s done,' and went to bed.'

The next morning, he had a message waiting for him on WhatsApp.

'What is this? I don’t understand.'

From aviation to underwater technology

Once refined and scaled to perfection, with precision down to the millimeter, that sketch became the winning design that secured the competition’s top spot.

The building is designed with a diagrid framework, where the skeletal structure provides the primary support. Inside, the entire space is column-free. Killa aimed to push the boundaries of construction technology to make it a cutting-edge, highly buildable design.

The building’s exterior features 1,024 panels, each representing a kilobyte of data, precisely cut using Computer Numerical Control (CNC) machines. And not a single panel is identical.

"We looked to the aviation industry to learn how they attach stainless steel to airplane wings and engines, chemically and mechanically bonding it to carbon fiber," explains Killa. "That’s essentially the approach we applied here."

For the lobby's spiral staircase—the world’s tallest double helix staircase—they sought inspiration from underwater design. "The contractor said it was impossible, that we’d designed something too complex to build. But we were confident there had to be someone who could make it, because it's essentially a spring," Killa recalls. The solution came from a manufacturer of submarine noses, who had the expertise and equipment to bend steel into the desired shape.

Did Killa ever doubt whether his vision could be realized?

"I knew it was possible to design because it’s like an egg, which is one of the strongest shapes in nature," Killa says. He points out that throughout history, from the Pyramids of Giza to the Pantheon in Rome, many of the world’s greatest structures were built at the cutting edge of the technology available at the time.

With its groundbreaking technological innovations, Killa has turned the Museum of the Future into a living testament to the architecture of tomorrow, right in the heart of today’s Dubai.

Museum of the Future, Sheikh Zayed Road, Trade Centre, Trade Centre 2, Dubai, United Arab Emirates