Maison Margiela Residences

Maison Margiela has spent 35 years asking what clothes are for. The answer, consistently, has been about construction: exposed stitching, raw hems, garments turned inside-out to show what holds them together. In Margiela Residences, the fashion house's first building anywhere in the world, that same question is applied to a 14-storey structure on the East Crescent of Palm Jumeirah. Only 25 apartments exist. The design language, executed by Carlo Colombo alongside the Maison's atelier team with Arquitectonica as the building architect, uses Margiela's décortiqué technique across walls and surfaces: optical white resin fills the indentations that construction leaves behind, making the structure's own logic visible as a design choice rather than a flaw. Travertine, Marmorino plaster, stitched-leather lighting fixtures, antique mirrors, every material is one the Maison has used in its own spaces since Martin Margiela opened in Paris in 1988. The furniture throughout, every sofa, chair, table, and light fitting, was designed specifically for these apartments and is not available anywhere else. The building sits on a private beachfront facing the open Arabian Gulf. The penthouse, La Maison Blanche, spans 18,804 square feet across two levels with a sculptural rooftop pool. This is where fashion ends and architecture begins, or where they become the same thing.