CLIENT
Open Lab
LOCATION
Expo 2020 Dubai, UAE
YEAR
2021
PROJECT TYPE
Permanent Installation – Pavilion Acoustics
Scope
Acoustic design across five floors of a high-traffic public exhibition space
Services Provided
- →Acoustic modelling and engineering
- →Specification of acoustic finishes
- →Room design for speech intelligibility and performance
- →Noise management and isolation
- →Privacy and comfort enhancements for meeting areas
The Brief
As part of Expo 2020 Dubai, DP World’s pavilion was designed to be a destination in its own right, an immersive, multi-storey experience that welcomed thousands of visitors daily. The centrepiece was a dramatic open atrium featuring a circular ramp, interactive exhibits, and a large water feature at ground level.
We were brought in by Open Lab to design the acoustic environment throughout the building, ensuring that the pavilion could accommodate events, exhibits and daily visitor flow, all while maintaining clarity, comfort, and a sense of cohesion from floor to floor.
The Challenge
The pavilion’s architecture was both its strength and its challenge. The open atrium was visually striking, but acoustically complex. A tall, open space with hard surfaces and a constant flow of people, all centred around a sizeable water feature, it had the potential to become a noisy, reverberant space where conversations and presentations might get lost.
Each gallery level opened onto the atrium, and had its own sound system, raising the risk of audio spill between floors. On the top level, corporate meeting rooms demanded an entirely different acoustic character: quiet, private, and refined.
Balancing these competing needs across a single, open structure required careful planning and detailed modelling.
Our Approach
Our work began with extensive acoustic modelling of the entire building, led by Luis Miranda. Using 3D simulation tools, we analysed how sound would behave across all five levels, tracking reverberation, noise transmission and speech intelligibility.
The modelling confirmed that the atrium would need broadband acoustic treatment to control reverberation times and prevent echo build-up. We recommended a combination of wall finishes and treatments for every floor, tailored to each gallery’s function and proximity to the central space.
For the top-floor corporate suites, we specified glazing systems, partition details, and ceiling and wall finishes to support both acoustic privacy and guest comfort, ensuring meetings could take place without distraction, even during peak visitor hours.
Technical Highlights:
Acoustic Design
Controlling Reverberation
The main priority was to bring the reverberation time under control throughout the atrium. By distributing absorption treatments on the vertical wall surfaces across multiple floors, we were able to achieve a more even spectral balance, preventing high-frequency build-up and ensuring speech intelligibility in both the atrium and gallery spaces.
Managing Water Feature Noise
The constant presence of water meant continuous ambient noise. We modelled its impact and ensured acoustic treatments were designed to mitigate its masking effect, so that exhibits and spoken content could still be heard clearly throughout the space.
Gallery-Level Audio Separation
Each gallery’s audio system had to deliver content clearly to guests without bleeding into neighbouring levels. Our modelling guided the selection and placement of materials that minimised reflection and spill, allowing for clean audio presentation on each floor.
Corporate Floor Privacy
The meeting rooms and event spaces on level 5 needed to offer a completely different experience, calm, quiet and discreet. We specified high-performance glazing, acoustic seals, and finishes that would provide isolation between rooms while maintaining the design language of the rest of the pavilion.
The Results
The DP World Pavilion became one of the most visited experiences at Expo 2020, and its acoustic environment played a key role in its success. Visitors could move freely through the space without feeling overwhelmed by noise, and the audio content in each gallery was clear, engaging and intelligible.
The atrium worked not only as an architectural focal point but also as a functional performance space, hosting talks, presentations and live moments with clarity and impact.
Upstairs, the corporate suites offered a refined environment for meetings and gatherings, insulated from the hustle and bustle below. Our acoustic design allowed the pavilion to operate seamlessly at multiple levels, supporting storytelling, interaction and hospitality in one coherent, dynamic space.
Acknowledgements
Our Client
A huge thanks to Mark and Andy from Open Lab for getting us involved in the project and congratulations for delivering one of the most visited pavilions at Expo 2020 Dubai.
Our Team
The acoustic engineering was done by Luis Miranda with support from Scott Willsallen.
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