To accompany the new Financial Times Gulf coverage, Edwin Heathcote, the FT’s architecture critic, visited Abu Dhabi, Dubai and Qatar with photographer Charlie Bibby to take a look at the extraordinary and ambitious building schemes underway.

Part one: Abu Dhabi With 95 per cent of the region’s oil reserves, Abu Dhabi wants to turn itself into the cultural capital of the region. Edwin Heathcote looks at the plans for a zero-carbon eco-city, and a island with a new Louvre and Guggenheim.