‘Architectural Intelligence’ is what MEAN* calls the knowledge held in the rooms and forms of traditional building around the world, from the courtyard and the gathering room to the screen and the shaded threshold, each shaped by the climate and customs of its place. The studio redraws that knowledge with today’s tools, from parametric models to large-format 3D printing, and tests some of it in full-scale prototypes.
Method
MEAN* uses computation, material research and digital fabrication to change how buildings are designed and made, as in a kiosk printed from recycled plastic or housing a family can extend.
This research takes the form of digital studies, physical prototypes, teaching and exhibition proposals.
Talks, Exhibition Proposals And Teaching
TED, Dubai, 2025: Reimagining Traditional Architecture for Modern Needs. Riyad Joucka’s talk asks for homes designed around the people who live in them. It draws on 3D printing and on lessons from traditional building that answer to climate and culture.
Assembled Identities Phase 2: the second phase of a curatorial proposal for the National Pavilion of the United Arab Emirates at the 20th International Architecture Exhibition, La Biennale di Venezia, 2027. It proposes an exhibition staged as a real estate showroom, where visitors would combine a limited kit of domestic components and see how the same parts can make homes that differ.
Assembled Identities Phase 1: the first phase of the proposal. It asks how housing designed in series can still carry individual and cultural identity.
Additive Dialogues: an interview series by Riyad Joucka with Prof. Adina Hempel, part of his Zayed University fellowship. Practices from WASP in Italy to Serendix in Japan discuss 3D printing, modular design and the majlis.
Permutable Assembly Phase 2: a proposal for the National Pavilion of the United Arab Emirates at the 19th International Architecture Exhibition, La Biennale di Venezia, 2025. It combines prefabricated concrete modules with large-scale 3D printing, so each home could be tailored to its owners.
Permutable Assembly Phase 1: the first phase, submitted to the National Pavilion UAE in 2023. It starts from a generation that may never own a home and proposes a new modular typology for accessible housing in the UAE.
Live Academy: an online platform for computational design education, developed by MEAL* (Middle East Architecture Lab). Practitioners teach classes in software such as Grasshopper and Blender, which students follow at their own pace.
MEAL*, Middle East Architecture Lab: the studio’s research arm. It runs short academic programs and workshops on new design technologies, among them the AA Visiting School Dubai.
Projects
Send Location: a flagship store in Dubai, organized around an octagonal majlis that hosts retail, gatherings and podcasts.
Lamella: proposed shading structures for NEOM, with a 3D printed concrete trunk, a UV-resistant polymer canopy and a steel frame, shaped after trees in a grove.
Meta-Modular: a proposed housing system for Dubai, courtyard homes with wind towers, dry assembly and 3D printed parts, made to grow as families change.
Cosmos House: a proposed family home in AlUla, a circular plan around a courtyard with latticed windows, a wind-catching stair tower and 3D printed mud walls.
Le Monde d’Hermès Kiosk: a pop-up kiosk for Hermès in Dubai Design District, designed to travel, its panels robotically 3D printed from recycled plastic.
3D Printed Majlis: a proposed modular majlis, the reception space of the Emirati home, designed for concrete 3D printing.
Modulus: a modular 3D printed urban furniture system for Dubai’s public spaces, built as a prototype for Dubai Design District.
Desert Pavilion: a proposed 3D printed pavilion in the desert of Wadi Rum, Jordan, with printed panels on a bent steel frame, a place to rest and gather.
Deciduous: a 3D printed pavilion in Dubai, with a printed concrete base, a birch floor and branching PET stems upcycled from 30,000 water bottles.
Sharjah Modern: a museum proposal for the Barjeel Art Foundation, with meandering limestone arcades, shaded terraces, flexible galleries and a courtyard designed to cool the building.
Sadaf: a proposed 3D printed bus stop for Dubai’s Roads and Transport Authority, shaped after the seashells on Dubai’s beaches and printed in interlocking pieces.
ARID: an installation for Amman Design Week 2017, a cracked-earth landscape robot-milled from natural Jordanian stone that calls attention to water scarcity.
MEAN*