Shimao Picks AS+GG as Architects for China’s Tallest Building

Developer Shimao Property Holdings has chosen a designer for its planned 700 metre (2,296 foot) tall tower in Shenzhen’s Longgang district, with Chicago-based firm Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill Architecture announcing earlier this month that it had won a competition for the project, which upon completion, would be China’s tallest building and if completed today would rank as the second tallest in the world.

At 700 metres, the Shenzhen-Hong Kong International Center tower, which started construction last May, nearly eight months before the project’s designer was publicly revealed, would be 68 metres taller than the Shanghai Tower, currently China’s tallest building.

Shimao had purchased the 321,900 square metre (3,465,000 square foot) site for the suburban development in December of 2017, and says that it expects to complete the project in 2024.

Shenzhen Learns to Go Vertical

AS+GG, as the design firm likes to call itself, will be designing the Shenzhen-Hong Kong International Center tower and also taking responsibility for the Shimao Shenzhen Longgang Master Plan, the design for the broader development which will incorporate a five-star hotel, offices, residential and conference facilities.

Shimao has said that it plans to invest up to RMB 50 billion ($7.34 billion) into the project after spending RMB 23.9 billion to buy the site between Longgang Park and Dayun Natural Park in Longgang district, around 50 minutes drive from Futian district, in the northeastern sector of the southern China metropolis.

“The Shenzhen-Hong Kong International Center is anthropomorphic in its character, representing and honoring in an abstract way the athletes that train and struggle to have the opportunity to perform in the world-class stadiums, arenas, and natatorium directly adjacent to and integrated into the overall AS+GG master plan for this project,” AS+GG Design Partner Adrian Smith said in a statement acknowledging the project’s relationship to the Shenzhen Longgang Sports Centre in the same district.

The top of the tower will contain the usual observation deck along with a club and a swimming pool. The tower itself is planned to have a nocturnal role putting on visual, sound and light shows for the surrounding area.

In addition to the supertall monolith, the master plan for the project calls for creation of a community of apartment towers in the northwest section of the plot, and a retail facility in the northeast corner, with room in the plan for a cultural centre and library, according to the designers.

Restacking the Tower Hierarchy

In addition to pushing aside the Shanghai Tower for the title of China’s tallest, the Shenzhen-Hong Kong International Center tower will be displacing the 599-metre-high Kohn Pedersen Fox-designed Ping An Finance Centre for the loftiest spot in Shenzhen.

While the tower’s planned 700 metre height would qualify as second tallest in the world right, behind the 820 metre Burj Khalifa, the vertical building landscape is set to see some changes before the Shenzhen project is completed in 2024, with the 711 metre Dubai One Tower scheduled for completion in 2021.

For AS+GG, whose founding partner Adrian Smith was formerly part of the team at SOM that designed Shanghai’s Jinmao tower, the Shenzhen deal is the latest China win, after the company and its team members have previously been involved in projects in Chengdu, Jinan, Beijing, Suzhou, Guangzhou, Hong Kong and other Chinese cities.

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