World's Tallest

According to a report in the Staten Island Advance, Staten Island, New York's third largest borough, could play host to the world's largest Ferris wheel.  Read More

The Burj Khalifa, which has held the title of world’s tallest building with a height of 2,717 ft (828 m) since its completion in 2010, may have its crown stolen by a new 3,445 ft (1,050 m) high building proposed for construction in Azerbaijan.  Read More

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.  Read More

An ambitious solar energy project on a massive scale is about to get underway in the Arizona desert. EnviroMission is undergoing land acquisition and site-specific engineering to build its first full-scale solar tower - and when we say full-scale, we mean it! The mammoth 800-plus meter (2625 ft) tall tower will instantly become one of the world's tallest buildings. Its 200-megawatt power generation capacity will reliably feed the grid with enough power for 150,000 US homes, and once it's built, it can be expected to more or less sit there producing clean, renewable power with virtually no maintenance until it's more than 80 years old. In the video after the jump, EnviroMission CEO Roger Davey explains the solar tower technology, the Arizona project and why he couldn't get it built at home in Australia.  Read More

The world’s tallest building opened yesterday, with a number of surprises including a new name. The 828-meter Burj Khalifa after UAE President Khalifa Bin Zayed, now holds a raft of world records including the world’s highest occupied floor (160th floor), the world's highest observation deck (124th floor), the world's highest mosque (158th floor), the world's highest swimming pool (76th floor), and the world’s tallest service lift. The tower is so tall it can be seen 95 km away, and breaks the previous record by 63% - quite some feat - check the CTBUH Top 100 Tallest Buildings database and the World’s tallest structures list for all the numbers.  Read More

If a gob-smacking view is your thing - and heck, it's mine - you could do worse than check in at the Park Hyatt, Shanghai, which has just taken the mantle of the world's highest hotel. See that nice pagoda-shaped building you're looking down on out the window? Yeah, that's the Jin Mao Tower, and it's about 40 meters taller than the Empire State Building in NYC. The Park Hyatt Shanghai occupies floors 79 to 93 of the Shanghai World Financial Center, the tallest tower in China at a massive 492 meters - and it's shaped like a giant bottle opener. Rack rates start at around US$320 per night, and ramp up to nearly US$13K for the stunning Chairman Suite.  Read More

The latest in a long-list of architectural wonders planned for Dubai's skyline, the Anara Tower is a 125-storey modern interpretation of the Minaret that will soar to almost 2000 feet and provide five million square feet of mixed use space including four sky gardens, a major Art Gallery, residential, retail and office space and a boutique five star hotel. Designed by UK based Atkins Designs Studio, the visually stunning skyscraper will also become the new global HQ for developer Tameer Holding Investment, which already boasts an impressive real-estate portfolio including the Princess Tower, Eye-Park and the Podium, a recently announced tower that will incorporate the world's largest LED screen.  Read More

It looks like Dubai is running out of countries to compete with in the architectural stakes, so they’ve started outdoing themselves. State-owned builder Nakheel has unveiled plans to build what would be the world’s tallest building before the Gulf city state’s previous claimant to the title, the Burj Dubai Tower, has even finished construction. Nakheel plans to build a tower measuring over 1 kilometer (0.62 miles), high in an area between two of the city’s artificial palm shaped islands which the company also created. Nakheel has not revealed the exact height or cost of the tower but said it would have “more than 200 floors” and be part of “a multi-billion pound development”, which includes a man made inland harbor and 40 additional towers ranging from 20 to 90 floors high.  Read More

Pepsi has announced it will create America’s largest Ferris wheel in New Jersey. The 287-foot-tall “Pepsi Globe” will be incorporated into Meadowlands Xanadu, a unique sports, leisure, shopping and family entertainment destination in East Rutherford.  Read More