Water world

The world's most bonkers hotel is now open for business. Ignore for a second Atlantis the Palm's £16m launch party, the 28 dolphins air-freighted from the Solomon Islands, and the 27-room spa. You can even ignore the fact that it sits on a monstrous man-made island in the middle of Dubai.

Focus instead on the architecture of this 395-foot construction. If Paris Hilton and Minnie Mouse ever got together to talk building design, this is pretty close to what they'd come up with. But what this project loses in finesse it more than makes up for in glitz. With 17 restaurants, a nightclub, private beach, waterpark and of course those faux, submerged ruins, this development is clearly more theme park than hotel.