Urban design · Saudi Arabia
Urban Design in Saudi Arabia. We make built environments better.
Urban design is the discipline of the space between buildings, the streets, squares, and public realm where a city is actually lived. We create and curate people-centred urban design in Saudi Arabia as part of our broader architecture services in Saudi Arabia, shaping public realm that gives a place legibility, character, and life.
Your urban design brief sits within Vision 2030's Quality of Life Program and the National Urban Strategy, which put liveability, walkability, and public space at the centre of how the Kingdom builds. From King Salman Park and the Sports Boulevard in Riyadh to the Giga-project cities, the ambition is places people choose to spend time in, not simply move through. The public realm you design now decides whether these districts feel human at street level, or whether they read as buildings with gaps between them. nicholas.design brings a regenerative, people-first approach with the climatic and cultural fluency the Kingdom's public spaces demand.
What we do
Urban design services we deliver
Saudi Arabia's Vision 2030 pipeline, backed by the Public Investment Fund (PIF) and delivered through the Royal Commissions, is being judged on the quality of the spaces it creates for people. We create and curate across the full urban design brief.
Public realm and streetscape design
We design the streets, squares, promenades, and open spaces that carry daily life, resolving movement, seating, shade, and materiality so the public realm works for the people who use it.
Placemaking and destination urbanism
We shape places people travel to and return to, curating the sequence of arrival, gathering, and dwell so a destination has a clear identity.
Walkability and climate-responsive public space
We design for movement on foot in the Kingdom's climate, using shade, orientation, planting, and water to manage thermal comfort so streets and squares are usable through more of the day and year.
Master planning frameworks
Urban design and the larger framework are strongest resolved together.
We carry the public realm up into the master planning in Saudi Arabia that structures the whole development, so the street and the plan speak to each other.
Master planning in Saudi Arabia →
Landscape and open space strategy
We plan the green and open space network as infrastructure, connecting parks, corridors, and waterfronts into a system that gives a district its lungs and its legibility.
Our work
Our urban design projects
Three commissions from our GCC portfolio that show the public realm and placemaking experience we bring to architecture services in Saudi Arabia and the Kingdom's liveability agenda.
Danat Al Bahrain, Bahrain
A master-planned island destination off Bahrain's southern coast, where the urbanism of the public realm gives the development its identity.
- Waterfront promenades, movement networks, and open space curated at destination scale
- Island urbanism designed around access, view corridors, and gathering
- Public realm framework designed to hold its character across phased delivery
CapitaLand Bahrain Bay, Manama
A mixed-use waterfront development where the streets, podium, and public realm knit a premium district together.
- Waterfront public realm and pedestrian network within a dense urban context
- Ground-plane activation linking retail, office, and residential uses
- Design management and lead consultancy across the development
East Point Riffa, Bahrain
A mixed-use destination in Riffa where the public realm is the connective tissue between retail, F&B, and workspace.
- Streetscape and open space designed for footfall and dwell-time performance
- Climate-responsive public realm for a suburban Gulf setting
- Full scope delivered from urban framework through to building design
Place
Urban design in Saudi Arabia: the Vision 2030 context
Three forces are reshaping every urban design brief in the Kingdom today.
| Quality of Life Program | Vision 2030's Quality of Life Program sets explicit targets for public space, culture, and liveability. Projects such as King Salman Park, the Sports Boulevard, and Riyadh's green network make the public realm a headline deliverable, not an afterthought. |
| Walkability and liveability | The National Urban Strategy prioritises walkable, human-scale districts. In the Kingdom's climate this is a design problem, and it rewards studios that can make streets and squares comfortable through shade, orientation, and planting rather than leaving them to the car. |
| Giga-project public realm | NEOM, Diriyah, Qiddiya, and the new Riyadh districts are being marketed on the life of their streets and squares. The public realm is where these cities either feel human or fail to, and it is commissioned at a scale that rewards genuine urban design ambition. |
Sustainability
Sustainability in Saudi urban design
We align with international sustainability standards on every scheme, whether or not formal certification is required by the client brief.
LEED for Neighborhood Development · the international standard for sustainable, walkable, connected urban places, covering street pattern, mixed use, and access
Mostadam · Saudi Arabia's national green building rating system, with a community and neighbourhood tier applicable to urban development across the Kingdom
Estidama · the Gulf's Pearl Community rating, applied to public realm and neighbourhood design across the region
Proof
Why clients trust us
- 30 years of GCC and international experience
- A suite of projects delivered across Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, UAE, Qatar, and beyond
- MIPIM Future Projects Award, Office category
- RIBA-chartered practice
Process
How we work
We follow a clear, collaborative process from the first conversation right up to ribbon cutting. No stage is delegated; the same team members stay on your project throughout.
Discovery. We start by listening carefully. A meeting or series of meetings to understand your brief, your constraints, and what success looks like for you and the people your project will serve.
Concept and design. We develop design concepts in close collaboration with you, working through agreed stages from Concept Design through to Detailed Design and Construction Documentation. You sign off at the conclusion of each stage.
Delivery. We act as lead consultant, coordinating engineering inputs and specialist consultants on your behalf, managing procurement, and guiding the tender process and contractor selection.
Construction and handover. We stay on your project throughout the build, monitoring quality and design integrity, managing commissioning and handover, and supporting you through the Defects Liability Period.
Why nicholas.design
Why nicholas.design for your project
Global standards. Gulf delivery.
RIBA-chartered design excellence, delivered by team members based in the GCC who know Saudi regulations, construction conditions, and cultural requirements inside out and from the ground up.
The principal you first meet remains the principal on your project.
No hand-over after the project award. Nicholas Bonaventure and the senior team stay involved from the first briefing meeting to the final handover.
Architecture that belongs to place.
We design with Najdi culture and Riyadh's climate embedded from the Concept stage. There are no imported solutions adapted after the fact.
The studio
Meet the team
Our founding director, Nicholas Bonaventure, has spent decades designing some of the Gulf's most exacting projects, including the Bahrain World Trade Center, Durrat Al Bahrain, Durrat Al Bahrain Marina and the Al Sharq Office Tower in Kuwait.
nicholas.design operates a collaborative and supportive studio environment. We work in English and Arabic, and can speak other languages including Hindi/Urdu. We are non-hierarchical, principal-led, and built to give every client the attention their brief demands.
About the studio →FAQ
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between urban design and master planning?
Master planning sets the overall structure of a development: land use, density, movement, and phasing across the whole site. Urban design resolves the experience of the spaces within it, the streets, squares, and public realm at human scale. We provide both, and they are strongest when the same studio carries the framework down to the street. See our master planning in Saudi Arabia page for how we structure the wider development.
How do you design for walkability in Saudi Arabia's climate?
We treat thermal comfort as a design driver from the first sketch, not a fix applied at the end.
- Shade from built form, canopies, colonnades, and planting on primary pedestrian routes
- Street orientation set to manage sun and capture prevailing breeze
- Planting and water used to cool key gathering spaces
- Shaded, connected routes between destinations so walking is a genuine option through more of the day
Do you design the public realm for Giga-projects and new districts?
Yes.
We work at district and destination scale, and our GCC portfolio includes waterfronts, islands, and mixed-use districts where the public realm carries the identity of the place. For Giga-project and Royal Commission briefs, we bring people-first urban design with the climatic and cultural fluency the Kingdom requires.
Speak with our team →What sustainability standards do you apply to urban design?
We work to neighbourhood and community-scale certification as standard, and target specific levels based on the brief.
- LEED for Neighborhood Development: certification for walkable, connected, mixed-use places
- Mostadam: Saudi Arabia's national rating system, applied at the community and neighbourhood tier
- Estidama: the Gulf's Pearl Community rating for public realm and neighbourhood design
Can you take urban design through to the architecture and landscape?
Yes.
We resolve the public realm, the buildings around it, and the landscape between as a single brief, from the master planning in Saudi Arabia down to the commercial architecture in Saudi Arabia and open space that complete it. One studio across all three scales keeps the street, the building, and the landscape coherent.
Start your urban design project →Contact
Commission your urban design project
nicholas.design
Office 2016, Level 19, East Tower
Bahrain World Trade Center
Isa Al-Kabeer Avenue, Manama 316
Kingdom of Bahrain
Tel: +973 7777 9524
Email: hello@nicholas.design
Hours: Sunday to Thursday, 8:30–17:30 AST
And by appointment
Our clients
Head office
nicholas.design
Office 2016, Level 19, East Tower
Bahrain World Trade Center
Isa Al-Kabeer Avenue, Manama 316
Kingdom of Bahrain
+973 7777 9524
Sunday to Thursday, 08:30 to 17:30 (Arabian Standard Time)
And by appointment
Saudi Arabia
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