The UAE is no stranger to luxury properties, and 2018 is shaping up to be another great year for posh hoteliers country-wide.
W Dubai, The Palm
The energetic vibes of Dubai’s Al Habtoor City-based W hotel has its niche, but if you feel like you could do with a bit more beach, then you’re in luck as the brand’s new outpost will be on the Palm Jumeirah, with a launch date of March 2018.
Dressed in gleaming tiles and graffiti-like Arabic calligraphy, an aura of glamour infuses the interiors. Outside, the layered white-and-glass low-rise sits alongside the beachfront. The ‘wet deck’ is likely to be the setting of much weekend revelry, but also keep an eye out for another W soon open in Muscat, Oman.
Mandarin Oriental Jumeirah Beach
A brand that has been conspicuously absent from the luxury-hotel-loving city of Dubai is the Mandarin Oriental. That is set to change when it opens later this year. Mixing local style elements with the brand’s oriental heritage, the design aims to bring the outside in with glass walls and infinity pools leading to the beach.
A pier-top restaurant will even allow private yachts direct access. Entering the market with a bang, a second, more urban property in Downtown Dubai is planned to open in 2020.
ME By Melia
Years in the making, late starchitect Dame Zaha Hadid’s Dubai project The Opus is finally nearing completion – and within it will be Melia’s luxury boutique-hotel brand. With an opening date that could be as soon as October this year, the hotel will include furnishings conceived by Hadid, lots of curves in and out of the 98 guest rooms, and a central atrium where layers of mezzanines are moulded in such a way that guests will feel as though they’re walking under the leaves of an enormous flower.
The Abu Dhabi Edition
Ian Schrager’s hotels rarely disappoint and his debut in this region will be with the modish lifestyle brand Edition Hotels, launching first in the UAE capital. Details have been hard to come by, but what we do know is that the 198-key hotel, on the Al Bateen waterfront in the Abu Dhabi Marina, will play host to signature restaurants, a gourmet market, a spa and a three-storey nightclub.
Kempinski Hotel Muscat
Okay, so it’s not technically in the UAE – but it’s close enough! The contemporary sibling to its more classic brethren on Palm Jumeirah, Kempinski is slated to premiere in Oman in the first half of 2018 along with an impressive two-kilometre stretch of white-sand beach. In the Al Mouj community (which hotel guests have access to) includes a Greg Norman-designed, PGA-standard, 18-hole golf course, ten restaurants and bars and the 400-berth Al Mouj Marina, which will be the sultanate’s largest private yachting hub.