Chrysler building, New York
by William Van Alen
It would be possible to write a list of top 10 towers without leaving Manhattan: the Woolworth, the Empire State, the Flatiron, the Seagram, the encrusted crags of the American Radiator building, the heroic blankness of the late twin towers. But if one were only to pick one, it has to be the Chrysler, for its combination of fantasy and elegance. Its top of gleaming semi-circles and triangles is pure Gotham. At the same time it has a miraculous slenderness, reinforced by a subtle play of horizontal and vertical that reduces its apparent mass
Pirelli tower, Milan
by Gio Ponti
The Pirelli tower is as sharp as Marcello Mastroianni’s suits, and wears its power as lightly as an Alfa Romeo. Completed in 1960, it is an emblem of the cultured modernity with which Italy charmed the world in the 50s and 60s. It stands alone in Milan, not emerging out of a cluster, and with no affinity to the older buildings around it, but it does not impose. You just know it is there, like the best-dressed man in a room. Its form, tapering at the ends, broke with the convention that towers had to be boxes, and inspired less graceful imitations such as Centre Point in London and the Alpha Tower in Birmingham
Marina City, Chicago
by Bertrand Goldberg Associates
Early skyscrapers expressed fantasy through encrustations of ornament, gothic, art deco, classical, Babylonian, Mayan – whatever the architect fancied. Next came the cool glass box favoured by modernist architects. Marina City, a development mostly of flats completed in the 1960s, rediscovered fantasy through the medium of endlessly repeated petals of curved concrete. The two towers look like things of nature and were, inevitably, called corncobs. The lowest quarter of each one is a spiral ramp of parking, a celebration of the car that resembles the ostentatious smoking of old film stars
Burj Khalifa, Dubai
by Skidmore, Owings and Merrill
It is hard to ignore what is not only the tallest habitable building in the world, exceeding the previous record holder Taipei 101 by 60%, but also the tallest structure of any kind. Being the biggest, of course, does not necessarily mean being the best, and Burj Khalifa is not. Its glittery, staggered exterior is essentially a reworking of well-known themes, while its base is set in a confected world of malls, rather than the intense street life of a Manhattan. But its sheer height and thinness, the sign of the pursuit of the record at the cost even of profitable floor space, make it extraordinary
HSBC, Hong Kong
by Norman Foster
The HSBC tower in Hong Kong is a work of finely crafted industry. Few buildings of this size have had so much attention paid to every detail, have had them considered and reconsidered, drawn and redrawn. The object was not to cut costs, but to achieve a kind of perfection. This was in keeping with its function as a symbol of Hong Kong’s identity. One critic said: “Its steel structure ripples across the façade like Sylvester Stallone’s pectorals”, which in 1985 was considered a good thing. But it is far less crude than Rambo. It has intricacy and layers, and you can pass under and into it
Highpoint One, London
by Berthold Lubetkin
The great modernist dream of the tower was that, by building high, the ground could be liberated for nature and recreation, for great parks where people could play sport in the sunlight and breathe fresh air. Usually lack of budgets for maintenance meant that these spaces became sad and menacing tracts of emptiness. At Highpoint One, completed in 1935 in Highgate, north London, the dream came true: built for prosperous residents who could afford a service charge, it has lush gardens and tennis courts, from which a refined white tower rises into the sky
Trellick Tower, London
by Erno Goldfinger
Highpoint One came at the beginning of Britain’s flirtation with the modern movement in architecture. West London’s Trellick Tower, completed in 1972, came at the end. It was one of the last of the tower blocks built for council tenants, an idea which by then had fallen from favour. It suffered familiar woes of neglect, isolation and crime, until it was made available only to people who wanted to live there. It then thrived, became sought-after and loved. It became possible to admire the well-proportioned force of its monolithic form, and the way it seems to turn when seen from moving cars on the Westway
Glass skyscraper project (unbuilt)
by Mies van der Rohe
Architects forever fantasise that glass towers are light, transparent and crystalline. Usually, due to the unfortunate fact that glass reflects, they are opaque and overbearing. This idea goes back to Mies van der Rohe’s astonishingly early proposal of 1919 for a curvaceous glass tower, designed without specific site or client: nothing like this was actually realised for 40 or so years. That this project started the delusion about transparency should not detract from the fact that it is a thing of grace and vision which, even with reflections on the glass, would have looked pretty good in real life
Kudrinskaya Square building, Moscow
by Mikhail Posokhin and Ashot Mndoyants
Is it possible to admire the towers of Soviet Moscow, without approving the man who had them built to glorify his rule, Josef Stalin? Yes it is, just as one can admire the pyramids put up by the not especially nice pharaohs. Kudrinskaya Square building, an apartment block for government-approved cultural leaders, is one of the “seven sisters” planned for the city. They aimed to emulate and outdo American skyscrapers and, though a little creepy, at least some of its menace has been diffused by time
CCTV, Beijing
by OMA and Rem Koolhaas
Another tyranny, another tower. This time it is China, and the headquarters for the great propaganda machine of their state television, designed by Rem Koolhaas, the man who has maintained his status as the world’s coolest architect for many years. He justifies it as a form of constructive engagement with the younger, more innovative elements of the Chinese establishment. The form of the building, bent into an angular loop, is supposed to foster a more interactive interior than the standard American corporate shaft. We will have to wait until its long-delayed opening to learn the truth of this
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