Dubai is no stranger to unusual tennis courts. In 2005, a court was built atop the 1,000-foot-tall Burj al Arab hotel to promote the Dubai Tennis Championships. And now an architect from Poland has proposed another strange court—one beneath the sea. Krysztof Kotala, who studied at London’s Royal Institute of British Architects, Poland’s Krakow Polytechnic, and Germany’s the Münster University of Applied Sciences, has envisioned an underwater tennis complex that could be built just offshore in the Persian Gulf, between the Burj al Arab and the Palm Jumeirah islands.
Part sports arena and part aquarium, the eccentric concept for the seven-court complex calls for a rooftop coral reef, which would bring an abundance of sea life to the area for spectators (and players) to view. It would also create the illusion of a natural atoll.
Bringing such a plan to reality would require overcoming some formidable engineering challenges, including creating a single piece of glass large enough to cover the structure and strong enough to withstand the pressure of the water. Should developers ever decide to tackle this project, Kotala thinks the arena would be the perfect spot for a fifth Grand Slam.
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