Air located in Dubai.

You think it's skyline would have looked like this long before 1979.

But in that year on Lee, a single 39 story building stood in Dubai, and some people wondered why it was there.

There are over 900 towers in Dubai, and every single one of them has been built in the last 40 years.

Before that, Dubai looked like this.

Then, in 1979 this a 39 story building in the middle of the Arabian desert.

This is the Dubai World Trade Center was the tallest building between Mumbai and Athens, including the whole of the Arab world.

So that made an impact.

That's guide Gilmar, the trade centers first employee, general manager and director.

The trade center stood alone in the desert.

People were extremely puzzled why, ah, high rise building would be put up in open land.

I think it's probably a world first.

It even got a visit from Queen Elizabeth on opening day.

She arrived by Car Waas, introduced to everybody before going on into the building, including May, of course.

And of course we flew the royal standard, which I think is quite unusual.

That's Gordon healed.

He designed and supervised the trade center, and here he is with the queen at the inauguration, along with lead architect John Harris.

It may divide, didn't it?

What you see now is this enormous metropolis of tall buildings on Did it was the trade center that said, It'll going It may seem obvious now build a business center in one of the wealthiest nations on the planet and you'll attract global companies.

But in 19 seventies to buy this was something new next to Gordon in this picture is she a rush?

Had been Seidel Maktoum, the ruler of Dubai and the prime minister of the newly formed United Arab Emirates.

It was his idea to build the skyscraper trade center in the first place.

For centuries, Dubai's main industry was pearl harvesting.

But in the 19 thirties, the pearl industry collapsed due to the Great Depression and the invention of the synthetic pearl.

But a few decades later, Dubai had another largely untapped resource, waiting to flow into the market in 1966 to buy found oil, and estimates show that the population grew by 1000% over the next 40 years.

By 1991 black gold accounted for around 50% of Dubai's GDP, creating a rich environment for new business.

Chirac used the proceeds of Dubai's oil to develop the city's infrastructure, including the trade center.

What he really wanted to do is to make a statement that the Dubai ciders in business and also a signal toe Abba, Dubbie, that you know we are your rivals Andi Way are really coming after you.

Building the first skyscraper in a nation isn't all straightforward, though.

For one, the sand in the desert wasn't right for the cement.

We actually had to use sand from the beach in its in its place, which seems a rather strange thing to have to do in the desert.

As nobody had seen such a tall building before, rumors were quick to spread.

There were lines of lampposts not far away, which which we're not quite vertical on.

I think that's what started the rumor that the tower was actually leaning.

And if that wasn't enough, when they reached the 10th floor of the trade center, Sheikh Rashid decided he wanted it taller, so demanded extra floors to be put on.

Originally it was designed with 33 then they increased it to 39.

Today, the 1.3 million square foot tower is home to 500 events a year, attracting three million people from 160 countries.

I think that the elements of skepticism about why is so much money being spent on this immense tower on the surrounding buildings quickly evaporated because the niche that we were able to exploit was to establish it on established Dubai as the premier business address in the Middle East mhm.