Qasr Al Watan Presidential Palace

Qasr Al Watan is the presidential palace of the UAE, built on the Al Ras Al Akhdar peninsula and completed in 2017. It has been open to the public since 2019; previously, it hosted foreign leaders and meetings of the Supreme Council. The façade is clad in white granite and limestone, while at the centre stands a vast 100-by-100-metre hall beneath a dome with stained glass and thousands of illuminated fixtures. Transparent mirrored cubes in the corners play with reflected light. The interiors feature an extraordinary range of chandeliers, including one in the meeting hall that weighs more than 12 tonnes and contains 350,000 crystals. The palace includes the House of Knowledge, displaying gifts from foreign leaders alongside a Quran and a Bible, and the Spirit of Collaboration in the western wing, where Cabinet meetings and international summits are held. In 2020, the palace was nominated at the World Travel Awards as the Middle East’s leading cultural attraction.

The presidential gifts room contains religious books, weapons, national costumes and objects made from precious materials. The palace’s centrepiece is The Power of Words, a golden spherical sculpture formed from quotations by Sheikh Zayed, turning language into three-dimensional Arabic symbols.