Neom unveils plans for "ultimate members' club" on the Gulf of Aqaba
Saudi mega-development Neom has unveiled Xaynor, which is planned as a beach-side members' club on the Gulf of Aqaba designed by Mexican studio Sordo Madaleno Arquitectos.
The latest in a series of tourist developments announced by Neom on the Gulf of Aqaba in the northwest of the country, Xaynor will be a private members' club set within a valley.
According to Sordo Madaleno Arquitectos partner Javier Sordo Madaleno de Haro, the development was designed to be the "ultimate members' club" that will "attract a unique community of the most fascinating people in the world".
The club will have a beach alongside the Gulf of Aqaba, with a series of pools, restaurants and a spa planned within a building topped with large rock-like forms.
"Xaymor is a luxury beach club that's completely blended in with the natural environment," said Sordo Madaleno de Haro.
"It's as though tectonic plates collided to create this magnificent structure that emerges in the Gulf of Agaba."
The studio hopes that the structure will be fully integrated into the surrounding landscape.
"Nature is the first architect and that's really what Xaynor is all about," said Sordo Madaleno de Haro.
"There's a mathematical language embedded in nature that we translate into our architectural environment," he continued.
"Xaynor doesn't just match the landscape, it is the landscape."
The announcement of Xaynor follows a series of resorts along the Gulf of Aqaba recently unveiled by Neom.
These include a trio of hotels arranged around an "exclusive sanctuary resort" designed by Dutch studio OMA and an "upside-down skyscraper" named Aquellum. The other projects announced in the area include luxury hotel Leyja, hexagonal-pillar hotel Siranna, jagged skyscrapers Epicon, Ricardo Bofill Taller de Arquitectura-designed Utamo and coastal yacthing town Norlana.
The projects all form part of Neom – one of the world's largest and most controversial developments. It will also contain a 170-kilometre-long city named The Line, which was recently highlighted as a "substantial risk to migratory species", as well as an Octagon-shaped port city designed by Danish studio BIG and a ski resort named Trojena.
The project has been criticised on human rights grounds, including by human rights organisation ALQST, which reported that three men were sentenced to death after being "forcibly evicted" from the Neom site.
Last year experts from the UN Human Rights Council expressed "alarm" over the imminent executions. Saudi Arabia responded to the UN by denying abuses had taken place.
The photography is courtesy of Neom.
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