Chicago-based firm Adrian Smith +
Gordon Gill (AS+GG) has officially been announced as the design
architects for the Kingdom Tower that is to be built in Jeddah, Saudi
Arabia. Initially planned to stand one mile (1.6 km) high and be called
the Mile-High Tower, the building was scaled down after soil testing
in the area in 2008 cast doubt over whether the location could support a
building of that height. Now the building will stand over 0.62 miles
(one kilometer) tall, which will still allow it to overshadow the 2,717
ft. (828 m) Burj Khalifa to claim the title of the world's tallest building.
The Kingdom Tower will be the
centerpiece and first construction phase of Kingdom City, a 57 million
square foot (5.3 million m2) development located along the Red Sea
north of Jeddah, which is known as the traditional gateway to the holy
city of Mecca. The entire development has been budgeted at US$20
billion, with the Kingdom Tower alone costing approximately $1.2
billion to construct and covering an area of 5.7 million square feet
(530,000 m2).
The
building will contain 59 elevators, including 54 single-deck and five
double-deck elevators, as well as 12 escalators. The elevators serving
the observatory will travel at 22 mph (36 km/h) in both directions. At
level 157, a sky terrace roughly 98 feet (30 m) in diameter intended as
an outdoor amenity for use by the penthouse floor extends from the
side of the building.
The
exterior wall system is designed to minimize energy consumption by
reducing thermal loads, while a series of notches on the building's
three sides create pockets of shadow that shield areas of the building
from direct sunlight and provide outdoor terraces.
The
three-sided tower rises from a three-petal footprint design with
aerodynamic tapering wings that help reduce structural loading due to
wind vortex shedding. Gill says the tower's sleek, streamlined form was
inspired by the folded fronds of young desert plant growth.
"With
its slender, subtly asymmetrical massing, the tower evokes a bundle of
leaves shooting up from the ground - a burst of new life that heralds
more growth all around it," added Smith.
While
the building's exact height isn't yet known, when completed AS+GG
claim it will be at least 568 feet (173 m) taller than the Burj
Khalifa, which was also designed by Adrian Smith when he was at
architectural firm Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM). At SOM, Smith
also worked on the design for the Pearl River Tower, while AS+GG also
recently won an international competition to design China's Wuhan
Greenland Center.
AS+GG
says design development of the Kingdom Tower is underway, the
foundation drawings are already complete and construction is set to
begin 'imminently."
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