Tessara is a villa in Abu Dhabi drawn almost entirely in curves. Floor plates sweep past one another, balconies run in arcs, and the roofline is a series of overlapping discs rather than a single ridge.
No straight lines where a curve will do
Curved buildings are expensive to draw and more expensive to build, so the geometry has to earn its place. Here it does two things. It shades itself, because each floor oversails the one below and throws the glazing into shadow for most of the day. And it turns the plan outward, so that every principal room faces the garden and the water rather than the boundary.
The facade
The upper storey is clad in a scalloped panel that catches the sun at an angle and breaks up what would otherwise be a very large pale surface. From a distance it reads as texture. Close to, it is a repeated unit, which is what makes it affordable.
