April 18, 2025
teamLab Phenomena: Abu Dhabi Opens a Building Made for Wonder
On Saadiyat's Cultural District, the Japanese collective teamLab opened a vast purpose-built home for immersive, living digital artworks — its first ever.
In April 2025, Abu Dhabi added another jewel to its growing Saadiyat Cultural District: teamLab Phenomena, a 17,000-square-metre building purpose-built for the Japanese art collective teamLab — the first structure ever designed from the ground up for their work.
Inside the curving, spaceship-like shell, 'phenomena' rather than objects take centre stage: artworks conjured from water, air, light and movement that exist only in the moment, shifting with the environment and the people who wander through them.
It joins the Louvre Abu Dhabi and a constellation of new institutions transforming the emirate into one of the most ambitious cultural destinations in the world.
Image: “TeamLab Borderless Azabudai Hills” — DannyWithLove, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.