Off the coast of Dubai in the Persian Gulf, dredging ships spray sand into the shape of three palm trees, a construction method called rainbowing because of the arcs the sand makes in the air. The film follows the project commissioned by Sheikh Mohammed to expand Dubai's coastline: Palm Jumeirah, built first starting in 2001 and ringed by a breakwater using over seven million tons of rock; Palm Jebel Ali, announced soon after; and Palm Deira, planned at 46.35 square kilometers, by far the largest of the three. Belgian firm Jan De Nul and Dutch firm Van Oord handle the reclamation work, guided by GPS as they move roughly a billion cubic meters of rock and sand for Deira alone. Developer Nakheel's plans call for over a hundred hotels, thousands of villas and apartments, marinas, and shopping malls across the finished archipelago, adding 520 kilometers of new beachfront to a city that had none to spare. The film treats the engineering itself, not the luxury branding, as the real subject.