Home Cinema Room Design — District One, Dubai
A Beautiful Home Cinema Room in Mohammed Bin Rashid City, Dubai
Following our Al Barari home cinema design, here’s another striking project. This cinema room design is for a villa in the District One development, part of the Mohammed Bin Rashid City complex. The cinema is a converted ground-floor bedroom (Bedroom 3 in a Type A villa, for those familiar with the development), and the room’s distinctive shape comes from building services running up the back right-hand corner. To balance the space, we mirrored this on the left-hand wall and squared off the room with a false front wall. The compact space created behind that false wall houses the AV and IT racks for the whole-home entertainment system serving the rest of the villa, with the architectural features of the resulting room highlighted by colour-changing LED strip lighting.
The Initial Room Design
After working through the layout challenges, we moved on to the client’s requirements. The brief was for a high-end cinema room built around comfortable, informal seating — the Cineak Strato range was chosen alongside a rough colour scheme, which together set the tone for the rest of the room. We comfortably accommodated seating for nine across two rows, all motorised, converting from traditional cinema seats to a chaise-longue-style day bed at the touch of a button, with independent control per seat. The rear row is elevated by 30cm to give a clear line of sight to the 4m wide projector screen, which fits comfortably within the 6m x 6m room.
The Audio Video Package
As with most of our cinema rooms, this one features an Artcoustic speaker package — here in 9.2.4 format. Three Artcoustic Spitfire 24-12 speakers sit in a void behind the screen for front left, centre and right, enhanced by two Control 3 subwoofers positioned between them. Each row of seating has its own Spitfire 8-4 speaker at ear height, with a further two Spitfire 8-4 speakers on the rear wall. Four SL Architect speakers provide height channels for genuinely immersive Dolby Atmos performance. The speaker package was carefully designed and laid out to deliver the same audio experience regardless of which seat is occupied.
The visual side is handled by a 4m wide Screen Excellence projector screen with a striking image from a range-topping Sony 4K laser projector. The projector itself sits in a small recessed pocket in the back wall — our preferred solution over a conventional projector mount.
Lighting Design & Control
A room of this calibre, with this quantity of light fittings, needs a proper control system. A Crestron lighting control system gives precise control of every LED strip and downlight — including the colour of the LED strip itself — creating exactly the right viewing environment along with a genuine sense of occasion on entry. The LED strip at the rear and sides of the room faces away from the seated viewer, allowing the room to run at unusually high ambient lighting levels without distracting from the screen.
Our Home Cinema & Home Theater Services
Read more about our Home Cinema and Home Theater work:
Design
Calibration
Treatments
Seating
Theatres
Cinema Ideas
The Cinema Construction
As with most of our projects, we transformed a blank concrete shell into a finished room, with our own team handling all joinery and construction. We source the world’s finest fabrics, fitted to the side walls and ceiling, concealing every piece of technology and acoustic treatment entirely out of sight.
Frequently Asked Questions — District One Cinema Room
How was an awkward room shape, caused by building services, solved?
The original layout had services running up one corner, so we mirrored that feature on the opposite wall and squared the room off with a false front wall — which also conveniently houses the villa’s wider AV and IT racks.
Can seating convert between formal cinema chairs and a day bed?
Yes. The Cineak Strato seats in this room are motorised and convert from traditional cinema seating to a chaise-longue-style day bed at the touch of a button, with independent control for each individual seat.
Why position the projector in a recessed wall pocket rather than a ceiling mount?
A recessed pocket keeps the projector out of sight and out of the sightline entirely, which we generally prefer over a conventional ceiling mount wherever the room’s construction allows for it.
Project Details
- Location: District One, Mohammed Bin Rashid City, Dubai
- Room dimensions: 6m x 6m
- Screen width: 4m
- Projection: Sony 4K laser (recessed wall pocket)
- Audio: Artcoustic 9.2.4 Dolby Atmos
- Seating: 9 — Cineak Strato, motorised, two rows
- Control: Crestron lighting
Interested in a smart home or home cinema installation in Dubai? Learn more about our Dubai services.
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