Why great cities want to join the mile-high club

The next-generation of super-tall buildings threaten to reach into the skies over a kilometer high. Trendhunter reports on the reinvigorated race to become the “biggest, tallest, most tremendous building in the world.” Surprisingly, although the list covers several extremely tall edifices climbing above the Gulf States, London features at the top.

Populararchitecture describes the Super Tower (above left) as a building “of unprecedented scale conceived not as a building so much as a vertical extrusion of the city – a new town in the sky complete with parks, public squares, schools and hospitals.” The shadow it would cast across the city would be incredible, although if it will be built is anyone’s guess given the current hoohar about about tall buildings in London.

Elsewhere, the post points towards the Burj Mubarak Al-Kabir (above right) in Kuwait. Standing over a kilometer high, the structure will be, again if it ever gets built, almost twice the height of Taipei 101, officially still the world’s tallest building. It has already won preliminary planning permission. Of course several engineering and logistical challenges have to be overcome to break into this new bracket of super-tall buildings. While questions about their ecomomic and environmental sustainability have to be asked. But the audacity of these designs is striking.

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Tags: architecture, building, construction, culture, environment, Gulf, kuwait, London, skyscraper, tapei 101, tower, world's tallest building