Donna Versace to build world's first air conditioned beach in Dubai

[웃 910]

Versace, the renowned fashion house, is to create the world's first refrigerated beach so that hotel guests can walk comfortably across the sand on scorching days. The beach will be next to the the new Palazzo Versace hotel which is being built in Dubai where summer temperatures average 40C and can reach 50C. The beach will have a network of pipes beneath the sand containing a coolant that will absorb heat from the surface. The swimming pool will be refrigerated and there are also proposals to install giant blowers to waft a gentle breeze over the beach. The scheme is likely to infuriate environmentalists. The revelation comes as more than 11,000 politicians, green campaigners and others are gathered in Poznan, Poland, for the latest talks on cutting greenhouse gas emissions. Last week the Met Office released a report warning that if greenhouse gas emissions continued to rise, the world could warm by an average of 5.5C by 2100. Inefficient buildings are one of the world's greatest sources of greenhouse gases. However, Soheil Abedian, founder and president of Palazzo Versace, said he believed it is possible to design a refrigerated beach and make it sustainable. "We will suck the heat out of the sand to keep it cool enough to lie on," he said. "This is the kind of luxury that top people want." Hyder Consulting, a British construction consultancy, is overseeing the engineering on the project. The hotel will be marketed strongly in the UK where Dubai is a popular tourist destination, attracting about 800,000 Britons a year. Abedian's firm began its association with Versace a decade ago with the idea of creating the first chain of luxury fashion-branded lifestyle resorts. The first Palazzo Versace is already operating on Australia's Gold Coast – where Kate Hudson and Matthew McConaughey, the actors, have stayed – and the Dubai hotel will be the second when it opens late next year or early 2010. The 10-storey hotel will have 213 rooms, several with their own internal swimming pools, plus 169 apartments. Fifteen more such hotels are planned. Competition to serve the world's rich is getting intense, especially in Dubai. The city already boasts the world's first seven-star hotel, the Burj Al Arab, while Armani, a competitor with Versace, is building a similarly branded Dubai hotel. The refrigerated beach is designed to give Versace the edge in this battle of luxury lifestyles. The system will be controlled by thermostats linked to computers. Versace's plans have shocked environmentalists. Rachel Noble, the campaigns officer at Tourism Concern, which promotes sustainable tourism, said that the carbon generated by such projects would contribute to climate change, whose worst effects would be felt by the poor. "Dubai is like a bubble world where the things that are worrying the rest of the world, like climate change, are simply ignored so that people can continue their destructive lifestyles," she said. Aided by cheap oil and gas, Middle Eastern nations have poured enormous resources into controlling temperature. About 60% of Dubai's huge power bill is for air-conditioning; each person living there has a carbon footprint of more than 44 tons of CO2 a year.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/envi...icle5338099.ece

[William33 110]

The city already boasts the world's first seven-star hotel, the Burj Al Arab, while Armani, a competitor with Versace, is building a similarly branded Dubai hotel. The refrigerated beach is designed to give Versace the edge in this battle of luxury lifestyles.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/envi...icle5338099.ece

7 stars on the self appointed standard. Why not 9 or 10 stars?

The only recognized rating systems are:

Michelin: rates restaurants at a maximum of 3 stars

Mobil travel guide: rates hotels/restaurants at a maximum of 5 stars

[SpiritAlight 1]

Two things popped to mind right away:

1. that scene from Wall-E (brilliant movie from those who may not have seen it yet)

where they have an indoor cultivated beach designed for ultra-comfort and no effort

2. words like: decadence and affluenza

Ha!

Sick, really.

[MrsCat 6]

such waste. just another way to separate humans from experiencing their true environment.

[Amby 490]

who is donna versace? a photographer http://versace.smugmug.com/

donatella versace? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donatella_Versace

[The_Dude 1,142]

Dubai is trying so hard to market themselves as "the place" for the uber wealthy to go to vacation. Look at some of the over the top architecture of hotels and office buildings. I think they are trying a little too hard. My analogy is that rich kid at college who was home schooled and had no friends. He throws his money at everything so everyone will think he's cool. Sad thing is everyone takes his beer money and laughs at him lolol

[MrsCat 6]

Dubai is trying so hard to market themselves as "the place" for the uber wealthy to go to vacation. Look at some of the over the top architecture of hotels and office buildings. I think they are trying a little too hard. My analogy is that rich kid at college who was home schooled and had no friends. He throws his money at everything so everyone will think he's cool. Sad thing is everyone takes his beer money and laughs at him lolol

great analogy!

[Amby 490]

Dubai is trying so hard to market themselves as "the place" for the uber wealthy to go to vacation. Look at some of the over the top architecture of hotels and office buildings. I think they are trying a little too hard. My analogy is that rich kid at college who was home schooled and had no friends. He throws his money at everything so everyone will think he's cool. Sad thing is everyone takes his beer money and laughs at him lolol

great analogy!

uh oh I was a rich home schooled kid but I had friends...I don't drink beer either...I'm scared

[spookyturtle 9,465]

Hopefully oil falls to $10 a barrel and the OPEC countries go broke like the rest of us.

[MrsCat 6]

Dubai is trying so hard to market themselves as "the place" for the uber wealthy to go to vacation. Look at some of the over the top architecture of hotels and office buildings. I think they are trying a little too hard. My analogy is that rich kid at college who was home schooled and had no friends. He throws his money at everything so everyone will think he's cool. Sad thing is everyone takes his beer money and laughs at him lolol

great analogy!

uh oh I was a rich home schooled kid but I had friends...I don't drink beer either...I'm scared

different, your parents obviously got you out and interacting with other kids, you certainly don't lack social skills or the ability to make friends.

[Amby 490]

Dubai is trying so hard to market themselves as "the place" for the uber wealthy to go to vacation. Look at some of the over the top architecture of hotels and office buildings. I think they are trying a little too hard. My analogy is that rich kid at college who was home schooled and had no friends. He throws his money at everything so everyone will think he's cool. Sad thing is everyone takes his beer money and laughs at him lolol

great analogy!

uh oh I was a rich home schooled kid but I had friends...I don't drink beer either...I'm scared

different, your parents obviously got you out and interacting with other kids, you certainly don't lack social skills or the ability to make friends.

back to donna

[The_Dude 1,142]

Just wait until the oil reserves of Saudi Arabia, UAE, Kuwait, Iran etc all run out. Their investments in foreign countries will be nationalized just as they did in the 1960's and 1970's to N.American and European countries.

Sorry for the analogy Amby, my analogy was based on a kid that lived on my hall during my freshman year in college. He was beyond wealthy, home schooled, and socially retarded, and above all, decadent. He had a big screen T.V., and a wine refrigerator and would buy a keg for any girl who would talk to him FFS.

But back to Donatella Versace. What shade of orange is she this week? Is that a side effect of the insane amounts of botox injected into her, or spray on tan?

[Scott & Lai 12]

such waste. just another way to separate humans from experiencing their true environment.

So, what is our "true" environment?

[Ban Hammer 12,829]

such waste. just another way to separate humans from experiencing their true environment.

So, what is our "true" environment?

or

[Pooky 3,343]

The only condition I like my beach air in is "fresh" - preferably from an on-shore breeze.

But not right now, because at the beaches round here, "fresh" currently means "sub-Arctic"