How to keep Unity Launcher hidden and locked but Super key should launch the Dash?

I'd like to keep the Unity Launcher hidden and locked to that state. But the Super key should still be able to launch the Dash. (With the auto-hide launcher feature enabled, tapping Super key for Dash doesn't seem to work when there's no active windows i.e. when desktop is shown. Is there any solution to that?) Also, the launcher should not appear when I launch the Dash or the panel run dialogue. I'd like to know if there is there a hack to launch Dash with mouse gesture.