Shanghai Tower Proves China is the New Home of the Skyscraper

The supertall 632-meter (2,073 foot) Shanghai Tower, more than China’s next record-setting building, will define Shanghai just as the Empire State Building did for New York in its time.  It’s also an economic lifeline for the elite club of skyscraper builders.

Financial gloom has derailed plans for new towers in Chicago (Chicago Spire), Moscow (Russia Tower (Башня Россия); Federation Tower (Башня Федерация)), Dubai (Burj Al Alam (World Tower); Dubai Towers)) and other cities,  but not in China.

While construction of other skyscrapers, such as Norman Foster's Russian Tower and Santiago Calatrava’s Chicago Spire, has been halted due to the economic crisis, the Shanghai Tower project is moving full speed ahead. The main structure of Shanghai Tower is seen here beside Shanghai World Financial Center and Jinmao Tower in Shanghai on Dec. 8, 2010

Work on the world’s second tallest building, the 121-story 632 m (2,074 ft) Shanghai Tower (上海中心大厦), is due to be completed in 2014. Construction on what will be the world’s third tallest building, the 606-meter (1,989-foot) Wuhan Greenland Centre （武汉绿地中心）,  started Wednesday in central China’s Wuhan City, capital of Hubei Province.  Dwarfed only by the world’s tallest 828 meter (2,717 foot) Burj Khalifa, both buildings will be higher than the 494-meter (1,622 foot) World Financial Center in Shanghai (上海环球金融中心), currently the tallest building in China.

The U.S. high-rise market is “pretty much dead,” said Dan Winey, a managing director for Gensler, the Shanghai Tower’s San Francisco-based architects. “For us, China in the next 10 to 15 years is going to be a huge market.”

China has six of the world’s 15 tallest buildings — compared with three for the United States, the skyscraper’s birthplace — and is constructing more at a furious pace, defying worries about a possible real estate boom and bust. It is on track to pass the U.S. as the country with the most buildings among the 100 tallest by a wide margin.

China is leading a wave of skyscraper building in developing countries that is shifting the field’s center of gravity away from the United States and Europe.

India, Brazil, Saudi Arabia and Indonesia have ultra-tall towers under construction or on the drawing board. In the Gulf, Doha in Qatar and Dubai, site of the current record holder, the 163-story Burj Khalifa, each has three buildings among the 20 tallest under construction, though work on all (Burj Al Alam and Dubai Towers) but one of those (Pentominium) has been suspended.

The 516 m Pentominium Tower in Dubai Marina, designed by Andrew Bromberg at Aedas, will be the tallest all-residential building in the world upon completion in 2013

The shift is so drastic that North America’s share of the 100 tallest buildings will fall from 80 percent in 1990 to just 18 percent by 2012, according to Antony Wood, executive director of the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat at the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago. He said by then, 45 of the tallest will be in Asia, with 34 of those in China alone.

“So 34 percent of the 100 tallest buildings will be in a single country. That has only happened once before, and that was with the USA,” he said.

In China, skyscrapers are going up in obscure locales such as Wenzhou, Wuhan and Jiangyin, a boomtown north of Shanghai. Touted itself as the richest village in China, Jiangyin Huaxi village in Jiangsu Province is building a 72-story, 328-meter (1,076-foot) hotel-and-apartment tower, Hanging Village of Huaxi (aka Farmer’s Apartments, 空中华西村) that will be taller than Manhattan’s Chrysler Building.

Hanging Village of Huaxi, designed by China's A+E Design, topped out at 328 meters (1076 ft) on September 5, 2010

China’s edifice complex is driven by a mix of demand for space in a crowded country with economic growth forecast at 10 percent this year and local leaders who want architectural eye candy to promote their cities as commercial centers.

Dozens of midsize Chinese cities are building new business districts to replace cramped downtowns. They look to the model of Shanghai’s skyscraper-packed Pudong district — China’s Wall Street — created in the 1990s on reclaimed industrial land.

Chicago Spire, designed by world famous architect Santiago Calatrava and was to be the tallest skyscraper in the Western Hemisphere, fell victim to the economic downturn.

China has four of the 10 tallest buildings under construction, versus two for the United States (One World Trade Center (Freedom Tower) and Chicago Spire)— and work on one of those, the 610-meter (2,000-foot) Chicago Spire, a twisting tower designed by Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava, has stopped. It would have been the tallest building in North America, but it fell victim to the economic downturn as Irish developer Garrett Kelleher’s company lost control of the site.

A Trio of Tallest buildings in China, Past, Present and Future: Jinmao Tower, Shanghai World Financial Center and Shanghai Tower

The Shanghai Tower will be China’s tallest office tower, surpassing the neighboring  Shanghai World Financial Center (SWFC) in Pudong. The 2-year-old WFC passed the Jinmao Tower (金茂大厦), also in Pudong, for the title. The finished tower will complete a government master plan that goes back 20 years to have a set of three super-buildings in the city’s Lujiazui finance and trade zone.  The Jin Mao is China of the past, the famous steel pagoda, it references history. The SWFC is the building of the present, that is, the China that accepts foreign investment. Shanghai Tower is a building of the future, a very dynamic form.

Shanghai World Financial Center was designed by William Pedersen of New York-based Kohn Pedersen Fox (KPF) and Jin Mao Tower was designed by Adrian Smith during his tenure at Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM)

The double-skinned Shanghai Tower will have an optimum capacity to accommodate around 16,000 people on a daily basis – about the same as the two former World Trade Center towers in New York combined. It will in essence be a small vertical city complete with offices, a hotel, retail space, entertainment venues, conference centers, banks, sky gardens, cafes and an observation deck. Shanghai Tower has already been awarded a Gold pre-registration certificate by the US Green Building Council, whose environmental standards are applied worldwide. Mixed-used buildings such as Shanghai Tower, the John Hancock Center and Willis Tower (formerly the Sears Tower), which are both in Chicago, offer the greatest scope for energy saving.

Nanjing Greenland Square Zifeng Tower, a 450-metre (1,480 ft) supertall skyscraper completed in April 2010, was designed by Adrian Smith, Marshall Strabala and Gordon Gill during their tenure at SOM.

Marshall Strabala, master architect behind Shanghai Tower, was brought into the project in 2006 by Gensler, who appointed him Director of Design after poaching him from SOM before the Shanghai Tower bidding process began. The bid was one of the most coveted in world architecture – all of the 10 or so major international firms were invited to compete as were the top local firms, with the final selection coming down to a choice between SOM, Foster and Gensler, a firm with an excellent reputation for interior design, but not well known for its architecture. Gensler capitalized on Strabala’s portfolio with the Burj Dubai and the Nanjing Zifeng Tower (Nanjing Greenland Financial Center, 南京绿地广场紫峰大厦) to win the bid and lead the project. Tongji University was selected as Gensler’s local partner and architect of record. The structural engineering firm for the project is Thornton Tomasetti. Marshall Strabala is now developing the craft in his new Shanghai-based firm, 2 Define Architecture. He established the boutique agency after he was let go by Gensler earlier this year after completing the bulk of the design work on Shanghai Tower.

Beijing's tallest building - China World Trade Center Tower III was designed by Chicago-based Skidmore Owings & Merrill

Shenzhen’s 115-story Ping An International Finance Center (平安国际金融中心) was designed by New York-based firm Kohn Pedersen Fox; the New York firm’s other projects include the 116-story East Tower of the Chow Tai Fook Centre in Guangzhou, also near Hong Kong. Chicago-based Skidmore Owings & Merrill (SOM) designed Beijing’s tallest building, the 75-story China World Trade Center Tower III (北京国贸大厦), and the 76-story Tianjin World Financial Center (Tianjin Tower, Jin Tower, 津塔) in Tianjin east of Beijing, due to be completed next year. Jiangyin’s Hanging Village of Huaxi (aka Farmer’s Apartments, 空中华西村) was designed by China’s A+E Design.

Ping An international financial center in Shenzhen was designed by Kohn Pedersen Fox (KPF)

Tianjin, a port and oil-refining center with ambitions to be a finance and tech hub, is building four towers of at least 75 stories. One of them, the Goldin Finance 117 (aka China 117 Tower, 中国117大厦) will be 117 stories and nearly 2,000 feet (600 meters) tall.

Instead of Western-style single-use office or apartment towers, many developers diversify their revenue sources by making buildings a mix of hotel and office space, with a shopping mall in the base and luxury apartments at the top.

The new space is hitting the market just as Beijing tries to cool a boom in construction of luxury housing and shopping malls. Regulators warn that a supply glut could leave lenders with unpaid loans if developers default.

But demand for high-end office space is so strong that the skyscraper market should face no such problems, said Danny Ma, director of China research for real estate consulting firm CB Richard Ellis. He said the new buildings should fill up quickly because many are the first in their cities to offer high-quality facilities required by foreign and major Chinese companies that are expanding there.

“More and more tenants are keen to move to such buildings,” Ma said. He said developers are signing up tenants in advance for 50 to 60 percent of the space in new projects, enough in many cases to make them profitable.

China is helping to propel development of skyscraper design and urban planning as developers face government pressure to make buildings environmentally friendly and integrate them into busy cities.

The Shanghai Tower will have a double-layer glass exterior to insulate it and cut heating and cooling costs, an advanced feature that might be rejected as too costly to install in the U.S. or other Western markets, Winey said.

“You can do a lot more experimentation here,” he said. “It’s an amazing place to be, because you can do things here that you can’t do anywhere else in the world.”

中国摩天大楼支撑全球建筑业

上海中心大厦不仅创造中国建筑高度记录,这栋在建的121层高楼也是全球摩天大楼家族建筑商的经济生命线。

经济衰退已经打乱了芝加哥、莫斯科、迪拜和其它城市的摩天大楼建设计划。但在中国,十几栋新摩天大楼的建设都在紧张进行,其中632米(2074英尺)高的上海中心大厦将按期在2014年完成。以强大经济实力为后盾的这些项目正在为建筑师和工程师提供源源不断的工作。

总部位于旧金山的建筑师行、上海中心大厦的设计师根斯勒总经理丹-维尼说,美国高层建筑市场“实际上已死亡”。他说,“对于我们来说,今后10年到15年中国是个巨大的市场。”

中国已有全球15栋最高大厦中的6栋,摩天大楼诞生地美国有3栋;尽管对于房地产繁荣与泡沫的争议存在,中国正在以更快的步伐建设。中国将在全球100栋最高建筑中以较大幅度超过美国。

印度、巴西、沙特阿拉伯和印度尼西亚都有超高层建筑正在建设或者正在规划。在海湾地区,卡塔尔首都多哈和摩天大楼现有最高记录保持者迪拜都各有3栋属于全球最高的20栋建筑在建设,但目前只有1栋高楼继续建设,其余全都暂停。

在全球最高的10栋建筑中,中国有4栋正在建设,而美国只有2栋,并且设计高度为610米的芝加哥大厦已经停工。

Just as many of New York City’s most iconic landmarks rose in breathtakingly brief succession a century ago,  Shanghai has been growing faster than anywhere else in the World since the early 1990s, ever – at one point, a quarter of the world’s cranes were in use here. By contrast to the restrictions and limitations of European and American cities, Shanghai, with its seemingly boundless possibilities and the upcoming 2010 World Expo, has become something of a construction free-for-all, a playground for some of the most celebrated names in architecture. The result has been some of the world’s most ambitious building projects – from China’s next tallest building to brand-new futuristic cities.

• Jin Mao Tower: the world’s finest skyscraper since the Chrysler Building

Architecturally a blend of the monumental Art Deco of the Empire State and Chrysler Buildings and the balanced composition of the traditional Chinese architecture of tiered pagoda, the Jin Mao Tower renews the long-standing Shanghai tradition of blending Western and Chinese styles, resulting in a dynamic hybrid that beautifully compliments the Bund’s colonial-era façades across the Huangpu River.  Like the Petronas Towers in Malaysia, the building’s proportions revolve around the number 8, associated with prosperity in Chinese culture. The 88 floors are divided into 16 segments, each of which is 1/8th shorter than the 16-story base. The tower is built around an octagon-shaped concrete shear wall core surrounded by 8 exterior composite supercolumns and 8 exterior steel columns. Three sets of 8 two-story high outrigger trusses connect the columns to the core at six of the floors to provide additional support. The enormous barrel-vaulted atrium, lined with staircases arrayed in a spiral, is the city’s most spectacular interior.

Jin Mao Tower (Jinmao Dasha, Chinese: 金茂大厦)
Location: 88 Century Boulevard, Lujiazui Finance and Trade Zone, Pudong, Shanghai
Chinese Address: 上海市浦东新区世纪大道88号
Constructed: 1994 – 1998
Height: 420 m (1,390 ft)
Floors: 88
Use: Office, Hotel (Grand Hyatt), observation (88th floor), retail
Architect: Adrian Smith of  Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM)

• Tomorrow Square

One of the city’s characteristic landmarks, thanks to the pincers on the roof.  The silvery futuristic skyscraper,  designed by the Atlanta-based architect, John Portman, is shaped like two squares on top of each other, with the upper on rotated at 45 degrees.

Tomorrow Square (Mingtian Guangchang, Chinese: 明天广场)
Location: 399 Nanjing Xilu, Western Side of People’s Square (Renmin Gongyuan), Huangpu District, Shanghai
Chinese Address: 上海市黄浦区南京西路399 号
Constructed: 1997-2003
Height: 286 m (938 ft)
Floors: 60
Use: Office, Hotel (JW Marriott), restaurant,apartments
Architect: John Portman & Associates

• Shanghai World Financial Center: China’s Tallest Building
  

The Shanghai World Financial Center isn’t just well known—it’s been making headlines for more than a decade. Its original 1993 design was halted after foundations were completed, just before the Asian financial crisis of the late 1990s. And the building also suffered a fire in August 2007, although damage was minimal. Named as the Best Tall Building in the World 2008 by the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat (CTBUH), the 492m-high Shanghai World Financial Center was designed by US super skyscraper specialist Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates.  The building’s most distinctive architectural feature is the aperture at the building’s top, which has a trapezoidal shape resembling a bottle opener. It was originally a circular shape (“moon gate”, a traditional element in Chinese gardens) but was changed after locals protested that the circular hole resembled the rising sun on the Japanese flag. The stunning all-glass 100th-floor observatory at the height of 470 m (1,542 ft.) is the world’s tallest observation deck.

World's highest observation deck inside the Shanghai World Financial Centre

Shanghai World Financial Center (Abbr.SWFC, Shanghai Huanqiu Jinrong Zhongxin, Chinese: 上海环球金融中心)
Location: 100 Century Boulevard, (Shiji Dadao), Pudong District, Shanghai
Chinese Address: 上海市浦东新区世纪大道100号
Constructed: 1997-2008
Height: 492 m (1,614 ft)
Floors: 101
Structure: Steel-framed and steel reinforced concrete
Cost: RMB 8.17 billion ( US $1.2 billion)
Use: Office, Hotel (Park Hyatt), museum, observation (94th, 97th and 100th floor), retail
Architect: William Pedersen of Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates (KPF)
Structural engineer: Leslie E. Robertson Associates RLLP (LERA)
Developer: Minoru Mori , Mori Building Co.
Website: www.swfc-observatory.com

• Shanghai Tower: China’s Next Tallest Building
  

Reaching for the sky, the spectacular design for the Shanghai Tower is a twisting, winding marvel of modern architecture. At 632 meters (2,073 ft), Shanghai Tower is said to rise 140 meters higher than neighboring Shanghai World Financial Center –currently the world’s highest observatory – securing its title as the tallest building in China. Shanghai Tower emphasizes sustainable design and innovative high-performance features. Organized in nine cylindrical sections, the segments are placed atop of one another, the tower has a double-skin facade that encloses the stacked buildings, while a triangular exterior layer creates the second skin, which rotates as it rises. The spaces between the two facades create nine atrium sky gardens. Shanghai Center Tower, slated to be completed in 2014, will be the second tallest building in the world surpassed only by the Burj Khalifa in Dubai, which stands at 828 meters (2,717 feet).

Shanghai Tower (Shanghai Zhongxin Dasha, Chinese: 上海中心大厦)
Location: Yincheng Zhonglu, Pudong District, Shanghai
Chinese Address: 上海市浦东新区银城中路
Groundbreaking Date: November 29, 2008
Estimated Completion Date: 2014
Height: 632 m (2,073 ft)
Floors: 128
Cost: RMB 15 billion ( US $2.2 billion)
Use: Office, Hotel, observation, retail
Architect: Gensler, assistance from the Architectural Design and Research Institute of Tongji University
Structural engineer: Consentini Associates, Thornton Tomasetti

• Shanghai Oriental Arts Centre

The Shanghai Oriental Arts Centre is a magnificent, glass-faced, flower-shaped building that houses a concert hall, entrance hall, opera theatre, exhibition space and performance hall – they form the five petals of a butterfly orchid. It was designed by French architect Paul Andreu, who was  responsible for the National Center for the Performing Arts (aka “The Egg”, 2007) in Beijing. To strengthen the effect of something delicate and unearthly, lights on the roof change color with the cadences of the music being played inside.

Shanghai Oriental Arts Centre (Shanghai Dongfang Yishu Zhongxin, Chinese: 上海东方艺术中心)
Location: 425 Dingxiang Lu,Century Park, near Yingchun Lu, Metro Line 2 Science and Technology Museum Station, Pudong District, Shanghai
Chinese Address: 上海市浦东新区丁香路425号
Constructed: 2000-2004
Auditorium capacities:
Philarmonic Orchestra Hall: 1,979 seats
Lyric Theatre: 1,054 seats
Chamber Music Hall: 330 seats
Phone: 020-6854-1234
Architect: Paul Andreu Architecte associated with ADPi and ECADI
Website: www.shoac.com.cn

• Jiushi Corporation Headquarters

The glass facade of Norman Foster’s forty-story tower, in the South Bund area, curves elegantly to make the most of fantastic views across the Huangpu River. It is also one the most eco-friendly buildings in Shanghai.

Jiushi Corporation Headquarters (Jiu Shi Tower, Jiushi Dasha, Chinese: 久事大厦)
Location: 28 Zhongshan Nanlu, Huangpu District, Shanghai
Chinese Address: 上海市黄浦区中山南路28号
Constructed: 1995-2001
Height: 168 m (551 ft)
Floors: 40
Use: Office
Architect: Foster and Partners

• Oriental Pearl Tower: The Earliest Symbol of New China
  

Love it or hate it, the 468m-tall poured-concrete shocker of a tripod tower has become a symbol of Pudong and of Shanghai’s renaissance. Erected in 1995 and hailed as the tallest TV tower in Asia, the Oriental Pearl Tower features 11 differing sized spheres joined by three columns. The design is said to be based on a Tang dynasty poem that describes the tinkling of pearls on a jade plate: The silver and dark-red spheres represent the pearls, while the Huangpu River symbolized the jade plate. Still more fancifully, the architects liken the city’s Yangpu and Nanpu Bridges to “Chinese dragons frolicking with the pearls of the Oriental Pearl TV Tower.”  The tower is dazzling when illuminated at night and you can always join the queue for the stunning panoramas of Shanghai.

Oriental Pearl Tower (Dongfang Mingzhu Dianshita, Chinese: 东方明珠电视塔)
Location: 2 Lujiazui Lu, Huangpu District, Shanghai
Chinese Address: 上海市浦东新区陆家嘴路2号
Constructed: 1991-1995
Height: 468 m (1,535 ft)
Floors: 14
Construction Type: Concrete
Use: Communication, hotel, observation, restaurant
Architect: Jia Huan Cheng of Shanghai Modern Architectural Design Co. Ltd.

• Shanghai Grand Theatre: Shanghai’s Lincoln Center

The Shanghai Grand Theatre, designed by French architect Jean-Marie Charpentier who achieved worldwide fame with the construction of the Bastille Opera House in Paris, incorporates the sweeping eaves of Chinese tradition with a futuristic use of plastic and glass, looks like a crystal palace when lit at night as the white arc-shaped roof joins coherently with the light-sensitive glass curtain wall. Located in the northwest corner of People’s Square, it boasts three separate theaters: a 1,800-seat main theater for ballet, opera, and symphony; a 600-seat medium theater for chamber music; and a 200-seat small theater for drama and fashion shows.

Shanghai Grand Theatre (Shanghai Da Juyuan, Chinese: 上海大剧院)
Location: 300 Renmin Da Dao, People’s Square , Huangpu District, Shanghai
Chinese Address:上海市黄浦区人民大道300号
Completion Date: 1998
Transportation: Metro Line 1, 2 & 8 People’s Square Station
Architect: Jean-Marie Charpentier of Arte Charpentier et Associés
Website: www.shgtheatre.com

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