Abu Dhabi's Department of Culture and Tourism has announced that Guggenheim Abu Dhabi will open to the public on December 11, 2026, on Saadiyat Island. The museum, designed by the late Frank Gehry, becomes the fourth institution in the Guggenheim's global network, joining outposts in New York, Venice, and Bilbao.
The project was first announced in 2006. Construction began in 2011, was suspended for several years amid economic strain and contract changes, and resumed in 2019. A 2025 completion date, set in 2021, ultimately slipped to this December.
The museum is composed of ten sculptural cones (nine clad in stainless steel mesh, one in onyx and glass) rising as high as 88 meters and forming an irregular skyline above a central atrium. Thirty galleries of varying heights and configurations surround the atrium, alongside a center for art and technology, children's facilities, archives, a library, and a conservation laboratory.
The museum spans 80,000 square meters of built area in total, with 11,600 square meters of interior gallery space and 23,000 square meters of outdoor exhibition areas, making it the largest of the Guggenheim's four locations.
Guggenheim Abu Dhabi has been building its collection since 2009, with holdings organized thematically, spanning categories such as Abstraction, Popular Culture, and Land, rather than chronologically. Guggenheim Foundation director Mariët Westermann has said the museum aims to present a regionally rooted but globally reaching collection, with significant works from the Middle East, Asia, and North Africa. Unlike the Foundation's other locations, acquired artworks belong to the government of Abu Dhabi, which has funded construction with over $1 billion, and major hiring decisions have been made jointly between the Foundation and the Department of Culture and Tourism.
The museum completes one of the last major venues in a cultural district the UAE has spent years and billions of dollars developing, following Jean Nouvel's Louvre Abu Dhabi, which opened in 2017, and Foster + Partners' Zayed National Museum, which opened in December 2025. Gehry also designed the neighboring Dar al Funoon Abu Dhabi performing arts venue, currently under construction on the same site.
