A skyscraper is a tall continuously habitable building having multiple floors. Modern sources currently define skyscrapers as being at least or in height, though there is no universally accepted definition. Skyscrapers are very tall
high-rise buildings
A tower block, high-rise, apartment tower, residential tower, apartment block, block of flats, or office tower is a tall building, as opposed to a low-rise building and is defined differently in terms of height depending on the jurisdictio ...
. Historically, the term first referred to buildings with between 10 and 20
stories when these types of buildings began to be constructed in the 1880s.
Skyscrapers may host offices, hotels, residential spaces, and retail spaces.
One common feature of skyscrapers is having a
steel frame
Steel frame is a building technique with a "skeleton frame" of vertical steel columns and horizontal I-beams, constructed in a rectangular grid to support the floors, roof and walls of a building which are all attached to the frame. The developm ...
that supports
curtain walls. These curtain walls either bear on the framework below or are suspended from the framework above, rather than resting on
load-bearing wall A load-bearing wall or bearing wall is a wall that is an active structural element of a building, which holds the weight of the elements above it, by conducting its weight to a foundation structure below it.
Load-bearing walls are one of the ea ...
s of conventional construction. Some early skyscrapers have a steel frame that enables the construction of load-bearing walls taller than of those made of
reinforced concrete.
Modern skyscrapers' walls are not load-bearing, and most skyscrapers are characterised by large surface areas of windows made possible by steel frames and curtain walls. However, skyscrapers can have curtain walls that mimic conventional walls with a small surface area of windows. Modern skyscrapers often have a
tubular structure, and are designed to act like a hollow
cylinder
A cylinder (from ) has traditionally been a three-dimensional solid, one of the most basic of curvilinear geometric shapes. In elementary geometry, it is considered a prism with a circle as its base.
A cylinder may also be defined as an infin ...
to resist wind, seismic, and other lateral loads. To appear more slender, allow less wind exposure and transmit more daylight to the ground, many skyscrapers have a design with
setbacks, which in some cases is also structurally required.
, fourteen cities in the world have more than 100 skyscrapers that are or taller:
Hong Kong
Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delta i ...
with 518 skyscrapers;
Shenzhen
Shenzhen (; ; ; ), also historically known as Sham Chun, is a major sub-provincial city and one of the special economic zones of China. The city is located on the east bank of the Pearl River estuary on the central coast of southern province ...
,
China with 343 skyscrapers;
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...
,
US with 300 skyscrapers;
Dubai
Dubai (, ; ar, دبي, translit=Dubayy, , ) is the most populous city in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and the capital of the Emirate of Dubai, the most populated of the 7 emirates of the United Arab Emirates.The Government and Politics of ...
,
UAE
The United Arab Emirates (UAE; ar, اَلْإِمَارَات الْعَرَبِيَة الْمُتَحِدَة ), or simply the Emirates ( ar, الِْإمَارَات ), is a country in Western Asia (The Middle East). It is located at th ...
with 237 skyscrapers;
Mumbai
Mumbai (, ; also known as Bombay — List of renamed Indian cities and states#Maharashtra, the official name until 1995) is the capital city of the Indian States and union territories of India, state of Maharashtra and the ''de facto'' fin ...
,
India
India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...
with 208 skyscrapers;
Shanghai
Shanghai (; , , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ) is one of the four direct-administered municipalities of the People's Republic of China (PRC). The city is located on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the Huangpu River flowin ...
, China with 180 skyscrapers;
Tokyo
Tokyo (; ja, 東京, , ), officially the Tokyo Metropolis ( ja, 東京都, label=none, ), is the capital and List of cities in Japan, largest city of Japan. Formerly known as Edo, its metropolitan area () is the most populous in the world, ...
,
Japan with 165 skyscrapers;
Guangzhou
Guangzhou (, ; ; or ; ), also known as Canton () and alternatively romanized as Kwongchow or Kwangchow, is the capital and largest city of Guangdong province in southern China. Located on the Pearl River about north-northwest of Hong Kon ...
, China with 152 skyscrapers;
Kuala Lumpur
, anthem = ''Maju dan Sejahtera''
, image_map =
, map_caption =
, pushpin_map = Malaysia#Southeast Asia#Asia
, pushpin_map_caption =
, coordinates =
, sub ...
,
Malaysia
Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federation, federal constitutional monarchy consists of States and federal territories of Malaysia, thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two r ...
with 148 skyscrapers;
Chongqing, China, and
Chicago
(''City in a Garden''); I Will
, image_map =
, map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago
, coordinates =
, coordinates_footnotes =
, subdivision_type = Country
, subdivision_name ...
, US, both with 135 skyscrapers;
Wuhan
Wuhan (, ; ; ) is the capital of Hubei Province in the People's Republic of China. It is the largest city in Hubei and the most populous city in Central China, with a population of over eleven million, the ninth-most populous Chinese city an ...
, China with 109 skyscrapers; and
Bangkok
Bangkok, officially known in Thai as Krung Thep Maha Nakhon and colloquially as Krung Thep, is the capital and most populous city of Thailand. The city occupies in the Chao Phraya River delta in central Thailand and has an estimated populati ...
,
Thailand
Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is b ...
, and
Jakarta,
Indonesia
Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...
, both with 108 skyscrapers.
Definition
![Home Insurance Building](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/38/Home_Insurance_Building.JPG)
The term "skyscraper" was first applied to buildings of steel-framed construction of at least 10
storeys in the late 19th century, a result of public amazement at the tall buildings being built in major American cities like
Chicago
(''City in a Garden''); I Will
, image_map =
, map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago
, coordinates =
, coordinates_footnotes =
, subdivision_type = Country
, subdivision_name ...
,
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...
,
Philadelphia
Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania#Municipalities, largest city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the List of United States cities by population, sixth-largest city i ...
,
Detroit
Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at t ...
, and
St. Louis
St. Louis () is the second-largest city in Missouri, United States. It sits near the confluence of the Mississippi and the Missouri Rivers. In 2020, the city proper had a population of 301,578, while the bi-state metropolitan area, which e ...
.
The first steel-frame skyscraper was the
Home Insurance Building
The Home Insurance Building was a skyscraper that stood in Chicago from 1885 to 1931. Originally ten stories and tall, it was designed by William Le Baron Jenney in 1884 and completed the next year. Two floors were added in 1891, bringing its ...
, originally 10 stories with a height of , in Chicago in 1885; two additional stories were added. Some point to Philadelphia's 10-storey
Jayne Building (1849–50) as a proto-skyscraper, or to New York's seven-floor
Equitable Life Building, built in 1870. Steel skeleton construction has allowed for today's supertall skyscrapers now being built worldwide. The nomination of one structure versus another being the first skyscraper, and why, depends on what factors are stressed.
The structural definition of the word ''skyscraper'' was refined later by architectural historians, based on engineering developments of the 1880s that had enabled construction of tall multi-storey buildings. This definition was based on the steel skeleton—as opposed to constructions of load-bearing
masonry
Masonry is the building of structures from individual units, which are often laid in and bound together by mortar; the term ''masonry'' can also refer to the units themselves. The common materials of masonry construction are bricks, building ...
, which passed their practical limit in 1891 with Chicago's
Monadnock Building
The Monadnock Building (historically the Monadnock Block; pronounced ) is a 16-story skyscraper located at 53 West Jackson Boulevard in the south Loop area of Chicago. The north half of the building was designed by the firm of Burnham & Root ...
.
:::—
Louis Sullivan
Louis Henry Sullivan (September 3, 1856 – April 14, 1924) was an American architect, and has been called a "father of skyscrapers" and "father of modernism". He was an influential architect of the Chicago School, a mentor to Frank Lloy ...
's ''The Tall Office Building Artistically Considered'' (1896)
Some
structural engineers define a highrise as any vertical construction for which wind is a more significant
load factor than
earthquake
An earthquake (also known as a quake, tremor or temblor) is the shaking of the surface of the Earth resulting from a sudden release of energy in the Earth's lithosphere that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes can range in intensity, fr ...
or weight. Note that this criterion fits not only high-rises but some other tall structures, such as
tower
A tower is a tall structure, taller than it is wide, often by a significant factor. Towers are distinguished from masts by their lack of guy-wires and are therefore, along with tall buildings, self-supporting structures.
Towers are specifi ...
s.
Different organizations from the United States and Europe define skyscrapers as buildings at least 150 metres in height or taller,
["Which World City Has The Most Skyscrapers?"](_blank)
''The Urban Developer''. 11 March 2016. Retrieved 26 March 2018. "The majority of international organisations, such as the CTBUH and Emporis, define a skyscraper as a building that reaches or exceeds the height of 150 metres."[Data Standards: skyscraper (ESN 24419)](_blank)
Emporis Standards
Emporis GmbH was a real estate data mining company that was headquartered in Hamburg, Germany. The company collected data and photographs of buildings worldwide, which were published in an online database from 2000 to September 2022.
On 12 Sept ...
, accessed on line July 2020. "A skyscraper is defined on Emporis as a multi-story building whose architectural height is at least 100 meters. This definition falls midway between many common definitions worldwide, and is intended as a metric compromise which can be applied across the board worldwide" with "
supertall
A supertall building is an occupied "supertall" structure higher than and beneath . A form of skyscraper, it falls midway between a common minimum definition of "skyscraper" (a building taller ) and a " megatall" building (taller than ).
Diff ...
" skyscrapers for buildings higher than and "megatall" skyscrapers for those taller than .
The tallest structure in ancient times was the
Great Pyramid of Giza
The Great Pyramid of Giza is the biggest Egyptian pyramid and the tomb of Fourth Dynasty pharaoh Khufu. Built in the early 26th century BC during a period of around 27 years, the pyramid is the oldest of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient Worl ...
in
ancient Egypt, built in the 26th century BC. It was not surpassed in height for thousands of years, the
Lincoln Cathedral having exceeded it in 1311–1549, before its central spire collapsed. The latter in turn was not surpassed until the
Washington Monument
The Washington Monument is an obelisk shaped building within the National Mall in Washington, D.C., built to commemorate George Washington, once commander-in-chief of the Continental Army (1775–1784) in the American Revolutionary War and th ...
in 1884. However, being uninhabited, none of these structures actually comply with the modern definition of a skyscraper.
High-rise apartments flourished in
classical antiquity
Classical antiquity (also the classical era, classical period or classical age) is the period of cultural history between the 8th century BC and the 5th century AD centred on the Mediterranean Sea, comprising the interlocking civilizations of ...
.
Ancient Roman insulae
The Latin word ''insula'' (literally meaning "island", plural ''insulae'') was used in Roman cities to mean either a city block in a city plan, i.e. a building area surrounded by four streets, or, later, a type of apartment building that occup ...
in
imperial cities reached 10 and more storeys.
Beginning with
Augustus
Caesar Augustus (born Gaius Octavius; 23 September 63 BC – 19 August AD 14), also known as Octavian, was the first Roman emperor; he reigned from 27 BC until his death in AD 14. He is known for being the founder of the Roman Pr ...
(r. 30 BC-14 AD), several
emperors
An emperor (from la, imperator, via fro, empereor) is a monarch, and usually the sovereign ruler of an empire or another type of imperial realm. Empress, the female equivalent, may indicate an emperor's wife ( empress consort), mother (empr ...
attempted to establish limits of 20–25 m for multi-storey buildings, but were met with only limited success. Lower floors were typically occupied by shops or wealthy families, with the upper rented to the lower classes.
Surviving
Oxyrhynchus Papyri
The Oxyrhynchus Papyri are a group of manuscripts discovered during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries by papyrologists Bernard Pyne Grenfell and Arthur Surridge Hunt at an ancient rubbish dump near Oxyrhynchus in Egypt (, mo ...
indicate that seven-storey buildings existed in
provincial towns such as in 3rd century AD
Hermopolis
Hermopolis ( grc, Ἑρμούπολις ''Hermoúpolis'' "the City of Hermes", also ''Hermopolis Magna'', ''Hermoû pólis megálẽ'', egy, ḫmnw , Egyptological pronunciation: "Khemenu"; cop, Ϣⲙⲟⲩⲛ ''Shmun''; ar, الأشموني ...
in
Roman Egypt.
The skylines of many important
medieval
In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire ...
cities had large numbers of high-rise urban towers, built by the wealthy for defense and status. The residential
Towers
A tower is a tall structure, taller than it is wide, often by a significant factor. Towers are distinguished from masts by their lack of guy-wires and are therefore, along with tall buildings, self-supporting structures.
Towers are specific ...
of 12th century
Bologna
Bologna (, , ; egl, label=Emilian language, Emilian, Bulåggna ; lat, Bononia) is the capital and largest city of the Emilia-Romagna region in Northern Italy. It is the seventh most populous city in Italy with about 400,000 inhabitants and 1 ...
numbered between 80 and 100 at a time, the tallest of which is the high Asinelli Tower. A
Florentine law of 1251 decreed that all urban buildings be immediately reduced to less than 26 m.
[Werner Müller: "dtv-Atlas Baukunst I. Allgemeiner Teil: Baugeschichte von Mesopotamien bis Byzanz", 14th ed., 2005, , p.345] Even medium-sized towns of the era are known to have proliferations of towers, such as the 72 up to 51 m height in
San Gimignano.
The
medieval Egyptian city of
Fustat
Fusṭāṭ ( ar, الفُسطاط ''al-Fusṭāṭ''), also Al-Fusṭāṭ and Fosṭāṭ, was the first capital of Egypt under Muslim rule, and the historical centre of modern Cairo. It was built adjacent to what is now known as Old Cairo by t ...
housed many high-rise residential buildings, which
Al-Muqaddasi in the 10th century described as resembling
minarets.
Nasir Khusraw
Abu Mo’in Hamid ad-Din Nasir ibn Khusraw al-Qubadiani or Nāsir Khusraw Qubādiyānī Balkhi ( fa, ناصر خسرو قبادیانی, Nasir Khusraw Qubadiani) also spelled as ''Nasir Khusrow'' and ''Naser Khosrow'' (1004 – after 1070 CE) w ...
in the early 11th century described some of them rising up to 14 storeys, with
roof garden
A roof garden is a garden on the roof of a building. Besides the decorative benefit, roof plantings may provide food, temperature control, hydrological benefits, architectural enhancement, habitats or corridors for wildlife, recreational opp ...
s on the top floor complete with ox-drawn
water wheel
A water wheel is a machine for converting the energy of flowing or falling water into useful forms of power, often in a watermill. A water wheel consists of a wheel (usually constructed from wood or metal), with a number of blades or bucket ...
s for irrigating them.
Cairo
Cairo ( ; ar, القاهرة, al-Qāhirah, ) is the Capital city, capital of Egypt and its largest city, home to 10 million people. It is also part of the List of urban agglomerations in Africa, largest urban agglomeration in Africa, List of ...
in the 16th century had high-rise
apartment building
An apartment (American English), or flat (British English, Indian English, South African English), is a self-contained housing unit (a type of residential real estate) that occupies part of a building, generally on a single story. There are ma ...
s where the two lower floors were for commercial and storage purposes and the multiple storeys above them were
rented
Renting, also known as hiring or letting, is an agreement where a payment is made for the temporary use of a good, service or property owned by another. A gross lease is when the tenant pays a flat rental amount and the landlord pays for a ...
out to
tenants
A leasehold estate is an ownership of a temporary right to hold land or property in which a lessee or a tenant holds rights of real property by some form of title from a lessor or landlord. Although a tenant does hold rights to real property, a ...
. An early example of a city consisting entirely of high-rise housing is the 16th-century city of
Shibam
Shibam Hadramawt ( ar, شِبَام حَضْرَمَوْت, Shibām Ḥaḍramawt) is a town in Yemen. With about 7,000 inhabitants, it is the seat of the District of Shibam in the Governorate of Hadhramaut. Known for its mudbrick-made high-r ...
in
Yemen
Yemen (; ar, ٱلْيَمَن, al-Yaman), officially the Republic of Yemen,, ) is a country in Western Asia. It is situated on the southern end of the Arabian Peninsula, and borders Saudi Arabia to the Saudi Arabia–Yemen border, north and ...
. Shibam was made up of over 500 tower houses,
[ each one rising 5 to 11 storeys high, with each floor being an apartment occupied by a single family. The city was built in this way in order to protect it from Bedouin attacks.] Shibam still has the tallest mudbrick buildings in the world, with many of them over high.
An early modern example of high-rise housing was in 17th-century Edinburgh
Edinburgh ( ; gd, Dùn Èideann ) is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 council areas. Historically part of the county of Midlothian (interchangeably Edinburghshire before 1921), it is located in Lothian on the southern shore of t ...
, Scotland, where a defensive city wall defined the boundaries of the city. Due to the restricted land area available for development, the houses increased in height instead. Buildings of 11 storeys were common, and there are records of buildings as high as 14 storeys. Many of the stone-built structures can still be seen today in the old town of Edinburgh. The oldest iron framed building in the world, although only partially iron framed, is The Flaxmill (also locally known as the "Maltings"), in Shrewsbury, England. Built in 1797, it is seen as the "grandfather of skyscrapers", since its fireproof combination of cast iron columns and cast iron beams developed into the modern steel frame that made modern skyscrapers possible. In 2013 funding was confirmed to convert the derelict building into offices.
Early skyscrapers
In 1857, Elisha Otis
Elisha Graves Otis (August 3, 1811 – April 8, 1861) was an American industrialist, founder of the Otis Elevator Company, and inventor of a safety device that prevents elevators from falling if the hoisting cable fails.
Early years
Otis was b ...
introduced the safety elevator at the E.V. Haughwout Building in New York City, allowing convenient and safe transport to buildings' upper floors. Otis later introduced the first commercial passenger elevators to the Equitable Life Building in 1870, considered by some architectural historians to be the first skyscraper. Another crucial development was the use of a steel frame instead of stone or brick, otherwise the walls on the lower floors on a tall building would be too thick to be practical. An early development in this area was Oriel Chambers
Oriel Chambers is an office building located on Water Street near the town hall in Liverpool, England. It was the world's first building featuring a metal framed glass curtain wall, which has since become a defining feature of skyscrapers aro ...
in Liverpool
Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a populat ...
, England. It was only five floors high. The Royal Academy of Arts states, "critics at the time were horrified by its "large agglomerations of protruding plate glass bubbles". In fact, it was a precursor to Modernist architecture, being the first building in the world to feature a metal-framed glass curtain wall, a design element which creates light, airy interiors and has since been used the world over as a defining feature of skyscrapers".
Further developments led to what many individuals and organizations consider the world's first skyscraper, the ten-story Home Insurance Building
The Home Insurance Building was a skyscraper that stood in Chicago from 1885 to 1931. Originally ten stories and tall, it was designed by William Le Baron Jenney in 1884 and completed the next year. Two floors were added in 1891, bringing its ...
in Chicago, built in 1884–1885. While its original height of 42.1 m (138 ft) does not even qualify as a skyscraper today, it was record setting. The building of tall buildings in the 1880s gave the skyscraper its first architectural movement, broadly termed the Chicago School, which developed what has been called the Commercial Style.
The architect, Major William Le Baron Jenney
William Le Baron Jenney (September 25, 1832 – June 14, 1907) was an American architect and engineer who is known for building the first skyscraper in 1884.
In 1998, Jenney was ranked number 89 in the book ''1,000 Years, 1,000 People: Ran ...
, created a load-bearing structural frame. In this building, a steel frame supported the entire weight of the walls, instead of load-bearing walls carrying the weight of the building. This development led to the "Chicago skeleton" form of construction. In addition to the steel frame, the Home Insurance Building also utilized fireproofing, elevators, and electrical wiring, key elements in most skyscrapers today.
Burnham and Root
Burnham and Root was one of Chicago's most famous architectural companies of the nineteenth century. It was established by Daniel Hudson Burnham and John Wellborn Root.
During their eighteen years of partnership, Burnham and Root designed and b ...
's Rand McNally Building
The Rand McNally Building (1889–1911) in Chicago, designed by Burnham and Root, was the world's first all-steel framed skyscraper.
History
The building was located at 160–174 Adams Street (on the south side between LaSalle and Wells) and ...
in Chicago, 1889, was the first all-steel framed skyscraper, while Louis Sullivan
Louis Henry Sullivan (September 3, 1856 – April 14, 1924) was an American architect, and has been called a "father of skyscrapers" and "father of modernism". He was an influential architect of the Chicago School, a mentor to Frank Lloy ...
's Wainwright Building
The Wainwright Building (also known as the Wainwright State Office Building) is a 10-story, terra cotta office building at 709 Chestnut Street in downtown St. Louis, Missouri. The Wainwright Building is considered to be one of the first aestheti ...
in St. Louis, Missouri, 1891, was the first steel-framed building with soaring vertical bands to emphasize the height of the building and is therefore considered to be the first early skyscraper. In 1889, the Mole Antonelliana
The Mole Antonelliana () is a major landmark building in Turin, Italy, named after its architect, Alessandro Antonelli. A '' mole'' in Italian is a building of monumental proportions.
Construction began in 1863, soon after Italian unificati ...
in Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...
was 167 m (549 ft) tall.
Most early skyscrapers emerged in the land-strapped areas of Chicago and New York City toward the end of the 19th century. A land boom in Melbourne
Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a met ...
, Australia between 1888 and 1891 spurred the creation of a significant number of early skyscrapers, though none of these were steel reinforced and few remain today. Height limits and fire restrictions were later introduced. In the late 1800s, London
London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...
builders found building heights limited due to issues with existing buildings. High-rise development in London is restricted at certain sites if it would obstruct protected view
A protected view or protected vista is the legal requirement within urban planning to preserve the view of a specific place or historic building from another location. The effect of a protected view is to limit the height of new buildings within o ...
s of St Paul's Cathedral and other historic buildings. This policy, 'St Paul’s Heights', has officially been in operation since 1937.
Concerns about aesthetics
Aesthetics, or esthetics, is a branch of philosophy that deals with the nature of beauty and taste, as well as the philosophy of art (its own area of philosophy that comes out of aesthetics). It examines aesthetic values, often expressed t ...
and fire safety had likewise hampered the development of skyscrapers across continental Europe for the first half of the 20th century. Some notable exceptions are the tall 1898 Witte Huis ''(White House)'' in Rotterdam
Rotterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Rotte'') is the second largest city and municipality in the Netherlands. It is in the province of South Holland, part of the North Sea mouth of the Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta, via the ''"Ne ...
; the tall PAST Building (1906-1908) in Warsaw
Warsaw ( pl, Warszawa, ), officially the Capital City of Warsaw,, abbreviation: ''m.st. Warszawa'' is the capital and largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the River Vistula in east-central Poland, and its population is officia ...
, the Royal Liver Building
The Royal Liver Building is a Grade I listed building in Liverpool, England. It is located at the Pier Head and along with the neighbouring Cunard Building and Port of Liverpool Building is one of Liverpool's '' Three Graces'', which line the ...
in Liverpool, completed in 1911 and high; the tall 1924 Marx House in Düsseldorf
Düsseldorf ( , , ; often in English sources; Low Franconian and Ripuarian language, Ripuarian: ''Düsseldörp'' ; archaic nl, Dusseldorp ) is the capital city of North Rhine-Westphalia, the most populous state of Germany. It is the second- ...
, Germany; the Kungstornen ''(Kings' Towers)'' in Stockholm, Sweden, which were built 1924–25, the Edificio Telefónica in Madrid
Madrid ( , ) is the capital and most populous city of Spain. The city has almost 3.4 million inhabitants and a Madrid metropolitan area, metropolitan area population of approximately 6.7 million. It is the Largest cities of the Europ ...
, Spain, built in 1929; the Boerentoren in Antwerp, Belgium, built in 1932; the Prudential Building in Warsaw
Warsaw ( pl, Warszawa, ), officially the Capital City of Warsaw,, abbreviation: ''m.st. Warszawa'' is the capital and largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the River Vistula in east-central Poland, and its population is officia ...
, Poland, built in 1934; and the Torre Piacentini in Genoa
Genoa ( ; it, Genova ; lij, Zêna ). is the capital of the Italian region of Liguria and the sixth-largest city in Italy. In 2015, 594,733 people lived within the city's administrative limits. As of the 2011 Italian census, the Province of ...
, Italy, built in 1940.
After an early competition between Chicago and New York City for the world's tallest building, New York took the lead by 1895 with the completion of the tall American Surety Building
The American Surety Building (also known as the Bank of Tokyo Building or 100 Broadway) is an office building and early skyscraper at Pine Street and Broadway in the Financial District of Manhattan in New York City, across from Trinity Church. ...
, leaving New York with the title of the world's tallest building for many years.
Modern skyscrapers
Modern skyscrapers are built with steel or reinforced concrete frameworks and curtain walls of glass
Glass is a non-crystalline, often transparent, amorphous solid that has widespread practical, technological, and decorative use in, for example, window panes, tableware, and optics. Glass is most often formed by rapid cooling ( quenching ...
or polished stone
Quarry tile is a building material, usually to inch (13 to 19 mm) thick, made by either the extrusion process or more commonly by press forming and firing natural clay or shales.American Society for Testing and Materials Standard ASTM C 2 ...
. They use mechanical equipment such as water pump
A pump is a device that moves fluids (liquids or gases), or sometimes slurries, by mechanical action, typically converted from electrical energy into hydraulic energy. Pumps can be classified into three major groups according to the method they ...
s and elevator
An elevator or lift is a cable-assisted, hydraulic cylinder-assisted, or roller-track assisted machine that vertically transports people or freight between floors, levels, or decks of a building, vessel, or other structure. They a ...
s. Since the 1960s, according to the CTBUH, the skyscraper has been reoriented away from a symbol for North American corporate power to instead communicate a city or nation's place in the world.
Skyscraper construction entered a three-decades-long era of stagnation in 1930 due to the Great Depression and then World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...
. Shortly after the war ended, the Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...
began construction on a series of skyscrapers in Moscow
Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 millio ...
. Seven, dubbed the " Seven Sisters", were built between 1947 and 1953; and one, the Main building of Moscow State University
The main building of Moscow State University (in Russian ''Гла́вное зда́ние МГУ'') a , 36-level (in its central part) skyscraper in Moscow, Russia. Designed by Lev Rudnev as the headquarters of Moscow State University, it is the ...
, was the tallest building in Europe for nearly four decades (1953–1990). Other skyscrapers in the style of Socialist Classicism
Stalinist architecture, mostly known in the former Eastern Bloc as Stalinist style () or Socialist Classicism, is the architecture of the Soviet Union under the leadership of Joseph Stalin, between 1933 (when Boris Iofan's draft for the Palace o ...
were erected in East Germany (Frankfurter Tor
The Frankfurter Tor ("Frankfurt Gate") is a large square in the inner-city Friedrichshain locality of Berlin. It is situated in the centre of the district, at the intersection of Karl-Marx-Allee and Frankfurter Allee (the eastbound federal highwa ...
), Poland ( PKiN), Ukraine (Hotel Ukrayina
Hotel Ukraine ( ua, Готель Україна), also referred to as Hotel Ukrayina, is a four-star hotel located in central Kyiv, the capital of Ukraine. It was built in 1961 as the Hotel "Moscow" in a location which originally was occupied by ...
), Latvia (Academy of Sciences
An academy of sciences is a type of learned society or academy (as special scientific institution) dedicated to sciences that may or may not be state funded. Some state funded academies are tuned into national or royal (in case of the Unit ...
) and other Eastern Bloc countries. Western Europe
Western Europe is the western region of Europe. The region's countries and territories vary depending on context.
The concept of "the West" appeared in Europe in juxtaposition to "the East" and originally applied to the ancient Mediterranean ...
an countries also began to permit taller skyscrapers during the years immediately following World War II. Early examples include Edificio España (Spain) and Torre Breda (Italy).
From the 1930s onward, skyscrapers began to appear in various cities in East
East or Orient is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from west and is the direction from which the Sun rises on the Earth.
Etymology
As in other languages, the word is formed from the fac ...
and Southeast Asia
Southeast Asia, also spelled South East Asia and South-East Asia, and also known as Southeastern Asia, South-eastern Asia or SEA, is the geographical south-eastern region of Asia, consisting of the regions that are situated south of mainlan ...
as well as in Latin America. Finally, they also began to be constructed in cities in Africa, the Middle East, South Asia and Oceania from the late 1950s.
Skyscraper projects after World War II typically rejected the classical designs of the early skyscrapers, instead embracing the uniform International Style (architecture), international style; many older skyscrapers were redesigned to suit contemporary tastes or even demolished—such as New York's Singer Building, once the world's tallest skyscraper.
Germany, German-American architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe became one of the world's most renowned architects in the second half of the 20th century. He conceived the glass façade skyscraper and, along with Norwegian Fred Severud, designed the Seagram Building in 1958, a skyscraper that is often regarded as the pinnacle of modernist high-rise architecture.
Skyscraper construction surged throughout the 1960s. The impetus behind the upswing was a series of transformative innovations which made it possible for people to live and work in "cities in the sky".
In the early 1960s Bangladeshi-American structural engineer Fazlur Rahman Khan, considered the "father of Tube (structure), tubular designs" for high-rises, discovered that the dominating rigid steel frame
Steel frame is a building technique with a "skeleton frame" of vertical steel columns and horizontal I-beams, constructed in a rectangular grid to support the floors, roof and walls of a building which are all attached to the frame. The developm ...
structure was not the only system apt for tall buildings, marking a new era of skyscraper construction in terms of multiple structural systems. His central innovation in skyscraper design and construction was the concept of the Tube (structure), "tube" structural system, including the "framed tube", "trussed tube", and "bundled tube". His "tube concept", using all the exterior wall perimeter structure of a building to simulate a thin-walled tube, revolutionized tall building design. These systems allow greater economic efficiency, and also allow skyscrapers to take on various shapes, no longer needing to be rectangular and box-shaped.[ The first building to employ the tube structure was the Plaza on DeWitt, Chestnut De-Witt apartment building,] considered to be a major development in modern architecture. These new designs opened an economic door for contractors, engineers, architects, and investors, providing vast amounts of real estate space on minimal plots of land.[ Over the next fifteen years, many towers were built by Fazlur Rahman Khan and the "Chicago School (architecture), Second Chicago School",] including the hundred-storey John Hancock Center and the massive Willis Tower. Other pioneers of this field include Srinivasa 'Hal' Iyengar, Hal Iyengar, William LeMessurier, and Minoru Yamasaki, the architect of the World Trade Center (1973-2001), World Trade Center.
Many buildings designed in the 70s lacked a particular style and recalled ornamentation from earlier buildings designed before the 50s. These design plans ignored the environment and loaded structures with decorative elements and extravagant finishes. This approach to design was opposed by Fazlur Khan and he considered the designs to be whimsical rather than rational. Moreover, he considered the work to be a waste of precious natural resources. Khan's work promoted Structural Art, structures integrated with architecture and the least use of material resulting in the smallest impact on the environment. The next era of skyscrapers will focus on the environment including performance of structures, types of material, construction practices, absolute minimal use of materials/natural resources, embodied energy within the structures, and more importantly, a holistically integrated building systems approach.
Modern building practices regarding supertall structures have led to the study of "vanity height". Vanity height, according to the CTBUH, is the distance between the highest floor and its architectural top (excluding antennae, flagpole or other functional extensions). Vanity height first appeared in New York City skyscrapers as early as the 1920s and 1930s but supertall buildings have relied on such uninhabitable extensions for on average 30% of their height, raising potential definitional and sustainability issues. The current era of skyscrapers focuses on sustainability, its built and natural environments, including the performance of structures, types of materials, construction practices, absolute minimal use of materials and natural resources, energy within the structure, and a holistically integrated building systems approach. Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, LEED is a current green building standard.
Architecturally, with the movements of Postmodern architecture, Postmodernism, New Urbanism and New Classical Architecture, that established since the 1980s, a more classical approach came back to global skyscraper design, that remains popular today. Examples are the Wells Fargo Center (Minneapolis), Wells Fargo Center, NBC Tower, Parkview Square, 30 Park Place, the Messeturm, the iconic Petronas Towers and Jin Mao Tower.
Other contemporary styles and movements in skyscraper design include Organic architecture, organic, Sustainable architecture, sustainable, Neo-Futurism, neo-futurist, Structuralism (architecture), structuralist, High-tech architecture, high-tech, Deconstructivism, deconstructivist, Blobitecture, blob, Digital architecture, digital, Streamline Moderne, streamline, Novelty architecture, novelty, Critical regionalism, critical regionalist, Vernacular architecture, vernacular, Art Deco, Neo Art Deco and neohistorist, also known as Revivalism (architecture), revivalist.
3 September is the global commemorative day for skyscrapers, called "Skyscraper Day".
New York City developers competed among themselves, with successively taller buildings claiming the title of "world's tallest" in the 1920s and early 1930s, culminating with the completion of the Chrysler Building in 1930 and the Empire State Building in 1931, the world's tallest building for forty years. The first completed tall World Trade Center (1973–2001), World Trade Center tower became the world's tallest building in 1972. However, it was overtaken by the Sears Tower (now Willis Tower) in Chicago within two years. The tall Sears Tower stood as the world's tallest building for 24 years, from 1974 until 1998, until it was edged out by Petronas Twin Towers in Kuala Lumpur, which held the title for six years.
Design and construction
The design and construction of skyscrapers involves creating safe, habitable spaces in very tall buildings. The buildings must support their weight, resist wind and earthquakes, and protect occupants from fire. Yet they must also be conveniently accessible, even on the upper floors, and provide utilities and a comfortable climate for the occupants. The problems posed in skyscraper design are considered among the most complex encountered given the balances required between economics, Civil Engineering, engineering, and construction management.
One common feature of skyscrapers is a steel framework from which curtain walls are suspended, rather than load-bearing walls of conventional construction. Most skyscrapers have a steel frame that enables them to be built taller than typical load-bearing walls of reinforced concrete. Skyscrapers usually have a particularly small surface area of what are conventionally thought of as walls. Because the walls are not load-bearing most skyscrapers are characterized by surface areas of windows made possible by the concept of steel frame and curtain wall. However, skyscrapers can also have curtain walls that mimic conventional walls and have a small surface area of windows.
The concept of a skyscraper is a product of the Industrial society, industrialized age, made possible by cheap fossil fuel derived energy and industrially refined raw materials such as steel and concrete. The construction of skyscrapers was enabled by steel frame
Steel frame is a building technique with a "skeleton frame" of vertical steel columns and horizontal I-beams, constructed in a rectangular grid to support the floors, roof and walls of a building which are all attached to the frame. The developm ...
construction that surpassed brick and mortar construction starting at the end of the 19th century and finally surpassing it in the 20th century together with reinforced concrete construction as the price of steel decreased and labor costs increased.
The steel frames become inefficient and uneconomic for supertall buildings as usable floor space is reduced for progressively larger supporting columns. Since about 1960, tubular designs have been used for high rises. This reduces the usage of material (more efficient in economic terms – Willis Tower uses a third less steel than the Empire State Building) yet allows greater height. It allows fewer interior columns, and so creates more usable floor space. It further enables buildings to take on various shapes.
Elevators are characteristic to skyscrapers. In 1852 Elisha Otis introduced the safety elevator, allowing convenient and safe passenger movement to upper floors. Another crucial development was the use of a steel frame instead of stone or brick, otherwise the walls on the lower floors on a tall building would be too thick to be practical. Today major manufacturers of elevators include Otis Elevator Company, Otis, ThyssenKrupp AG, ThyssenKrupp, Schindler Group, Schindler, and KONE.
Advances in construction techniques have allowed skyscrapers to narrow in width, while increasing in height. Some of these new techniques include Tuned mass damper, mass dampers to reduce vibrations and swaying, and gaps to allow air to pass through, reducing wind shear.
Basic design considerations
Good structural design is important in most building design, but particularly for skyscrapers since even a small chance of catastrophic failure is unacceptable given the high price. This presents a paradox to Civil engineering, civil engineers: the only way to assure a lack of failure is to test for all modes of failure, in both the laboratory and the real world. But the only way to know of all modes of failure is to learn from previous failures. Thus, no engineer can be absolutely sure that a given structure will resist all loadings that could cause failure, but can only have large enough margins of safety such that a failure is acceptably unlikely. When buildings do fail, engineers question whether the failure was due to some lack of foresight or due to some unknowable factor.
Loading and vibration
The load a skyscraper experiences is largely from the force of the building material itself. In most building designs, the weight of the structure is much larger than the weight of the material that it will support beyond its own weight. In technical terms, the dead load, the load of the structure, is larger than the live load, the weight of things in the structure (people, furniture, vehicles, etc.). As such, the amount of structural material required within the lower levels of a skyscraper will be much larger than the material required within higher levels. This is not always visually apparent. The Empire State Building's setbacks are actually a result of the building code at the time (1916 Zoning Resolution), and were not structurally required. On the other hand, John Hancock Center's shape is uniquely the result of how it supports loads. Vertical supports can come in several types, among which the most common for skyscrapers can be categorized as steel frames, concrete cores, tube within tube design, and shear walls.
The wind loading on a skyscraper is also considerable. In fact, the lateral wind load imposed on supertall structures is generally the governing factor in the structural design. Wind pressure increases with height, so for very tall buildings, the loads associated with wind are larger than dead or live loads.
Other vertical and horizontal loading factors come from varied, unpredictable sources, such as earthquakes.
Steel frame
By 1895, steel had replaced cast iron as skyscrapers' structural material. Its malleability allowed it to be formed into a variety of shapes, and it could be riveted, ensuring strong connections. The simplicity of a steel frame eliminated the inefficient part of a shear wall, the central portion, and consolidated support members in a much stronger fashion by allowing both horizontal and vertical supports throughout. Among steel's drawbacks is that as more material must be supported as height increases, the distance between supporting members must decrease, which in turn increases the amount of material that must be supported. This becomes inefficient and uneconomic for buildings above 40 storeys tall as usable floor spaces are reduced for supporting column and due to more usage of steel.
Tube structural systems
A new structural system of framed tubes was developed by Fazlur Rahman Khan in 1963. The framed tube structure is defined as "a three dimensional space structure composed of three, four, or possibly more frames, braced frames, or shear walls, joined at or near their edges to form a vertical tube-like structural system capable of resisting lateral forces in any direction by cantilevering from the foundation". Closely spaced interconnected exterior columns form the tube. Horizontal loads (primarily wind) are supported by the structure as a whole. Framed tubes allow fewer interior columns, and so create more usable floor space, and about half the exterior surface is available for windows. Where larger openings like garage doors are required, the tube frame must be interrupted, with transfer girders used to maintain structural integrity. Tube structures cut down costs, at the same time allowing buildings to reach greater heights. Concrete tube-frame construction[ was first used in the DeWitt-Chestnut Apartment Building, completed in ]Chicago
(''City in a Garden''); I Will
, image_map =
, map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago
, coordinates =
, coordinates_footnotes =
, subdivision_type = Country
, subdivision_name ...
in 1963, and soon after in the John Hancock Center and construction of the World Trade Center, World Trade Center.
The tube (structure), tubular systems are fundamental to tall building design. Most buildings over 40-storeys constructed since the 1960s now use a tube design derived from Khan's structural engineering principles, examples including the construction of the World Trade Center, Aon Center (Chicago), Aon Center, Petronas Towers, Jin Mao Building, and most other supertall skyscrapers since the 1960s.[ The strong influence of tube structure design is also evident in the construction of the current tallest skyscraper, the Burj Khalifa.]
Trussed tube and X-bracing:
Khan pioneered several other variations of the tube structure design. One of these was the concept of X-bracing, or the Tube (structure)#Trussed tube, trussed tube, first employed for the John Hancock Center. This concept reduced the lateral load on the building by transferring the load into the exterior columns. This allows for a reduced need for interior columns thus creating more floor space. This concept can be seen in the John Hancock Center, designed in 1965 and completed in 1969. One of the most famous buildings of the Structural Expressionism, structural expressionist style, the skyscraper's distinctive X-bracing exterior is actually a hint that the structure's skin is indeed part of its 'tubular system'. This idea is one of the architectural techniques the building used to climb to record heights (the tubular system is essentially the spine that helps the building stand upright during wind and seismic loading, earthquake loads). This X-bracing allows for both higher performance from tall structures and the ability to open up the inside floorplan (and usable floor space) if the architect desires.
The John Hancock Center was far more efficient than earlier Steel frame, steel-frame structures. Where the Empire State Building (1931), required about 206 kilograms of steel per square metre and 28 Liberty Street (1961) required 275, the John Hancock Center required only 145.[ The trussed tube concept was applied to many later skyscrapers, including the Onterie Center, Citigroup Center and Bank of China Tower, Hong Kong, Bank of China Tower.]
Bundled tube:
An important variation on the tube frame is the Tube (structure)#Bundled tube, bundled tube, which uses several interconnected tube frames. The Willis Tower in Chicago used this design, employing nine tubes of varying height to achieve its distinct appearance. The bundled tube structure meant that "buildings no longer need be boxlike in appearance: they could become sculpture."[
Tube in tube:
Tube-in-tube system takes advantage of core shear wall tubes in addition to exterior tubes. The inner tube and outer tube work together to resist gravity loads and lateral loads and to provide additional rigidity to the structure to prevent significant deflections at the top. This design was first used in One Shell Plaza. Later buildings to use this structural system include the Petronas Towers.
Outrigger and belt truss:
The outrigger and belt truss system is a lateral load resisting system in which the tube structure is connected to the central core wall with very stiff outriggers and belt trusses at one or more levels.] BHP House was the first building to use this structural system followed by the First Wisconsin Center, since renamed U.S. Bank Center (Milwaukee), U.S. Bank Center, in Milwaukee. The center rises 601 feet, with three belt trusses at the bottom, middle and top of the building. The exposed belt trusses serve aesthetic and structural purposes. Later buildings to use this include Shanghai World Financial Center.
Concrete tube structures:
The last major buildings engineered by Khan were the One Magnificent Mile and Onterie Center in Chicago, which employed his bundled tube and trussed tube system designs respectively. In contrast to his earlier buildings, which were mainly steel, his last two buildings were concrete. His earlier DeWitt-Chestnut Apartments building, built in 1963 in Chicago, was also a concrete building with a tube structure.[ Trump Tower in New York City is also another example that adapted this system.
Shear wall frame interaction system:
Khan developed the shear wall frame interaction system for mid high-rise buildings. This structural system uses combinations of shear walls and frames designed to resist lateral forces. The first building to use this structural system was the 35-stories Brunswick Building.] The Brunswick building was completed in 1965 and became the tallest reinforced concrete structure of its time. The structural system of Brunswick Building consists of a concrete shear wall core surrounded by an outer concrete frame of columns and spandrels. Apartment buildings up to 70 stories high have successfully used this concept.
The elevator conundrum
The invention of the elevator
An elevator or lift is a cable-assisted, hydraulic cylinder-assisted, or roller-track assisted machine that vertically transports people or freight between floors, levels, or decks of a building, vessel, or other structure. They a ...
was a precondition for the invention of skyscrapers, given that most people would not (or could not) climb more than a few flights of stairs at a time. The elevators in a skyscraper are not simply a necessary utility, like running water and electricity, but are in fact closely related to the design of the whole structure: a taller building requires more elevators to service the additional floors, but the elevator shafts consume valuable floor space. If the service core, which contains the elevator shafts, becomes too big, it can reduce the profitability of the building. Architects must therefore balance the value gained by adding height against the value lost to the expanding service core.
Many tall buildings use elevators in a non-standard configuration to reduce their footprint. Buildings such as the former World Trade Center (1973–2001), World Trade Center Towers and Chicago's John Hancock Center use sky lobby, sky lobbies, where express elevators take passengers to upper floors which serve as the base for local elevators. This allows architects and engineers to place elevator shafts on top of each other, saving space. Sky lobbies and express elevators take up a significant amount of space, however, and add to the amount of time spent commuting between floors.
Other buildings, such as the Petronas Towers, use double-deck elevators, allowing more people to fit in a single elevator, and reaching two floors at every stop. It is possible to use even more than two levels on an elevator, although this has never been done. The main problem with double-deck elevators is that they cause everyone in the elevator to stop when only person on one level needs to get off at a given floor.
Buildings with sky lobbies include the World Trade Center (2001–present), World Trade Center, Petronas Twin Towers, Willis Tower and Taipei 101. The 44th-floor sky lobby of the John Hancock Center also featured the first high-rise indoor swimming pool, which remains the highest in the United States.
Economic rationale
Skyscrapers are usually situated in city centers where the price of land is high. Constructing a skyscraper becomes justified if the price of land is so high that it makes economics, economic sense to build upward as to minimize the cost of the land per the total floor area of a building. Thus the construction of skyscrapers is dictated by economics and results in skyscrapers in a certain part of a large city unless a building code restricts the height of buildings.
Skyscrapers are rarely seen in small cities and they are characteristic of large cities, because of the critical importance of high land prices for the construction of skyscrapers. Usually only office, commercial and hotel users can afford the rents in the city center and thus most tenants of skyscrapers are of these classes.
Today, skyscrapers are an increasingly common sight where land is expensive, as in the centers of big cities, because they provide such a high ratio of rentable floor space per unit area of land.
Another disadvantage of very high skyscrapers is the loss of usable floorspace, as many elevator shafts are needed to enable performant vertical travelling. This led to the introduction of express lifts and sky lobby, sky lobbies where transfer to slower distribution lifts can be done.
Environmental impact
Constructing a single skyscraper requires large quantities of materials like steel, concrete, and glass, and these materials represent significant embodied energy. Skyscrapers are thus material and energy intensive buildings.
Skyscrapers have considerable mass, requiring a stronger foundation than a shorter, lighter building. In construction, building materials must be lifted to the top of a skyscraper during construction, requiring more energy than would be necessary at lower heights. Furthermore, a skyscraper consumes much electricity because potable and non-potable water have to be pumped to the highest occupied floors, skyscrapers are usually designed to be HVAC, mechanically ventilated, elevators are generally used instead of stairs, and electric lights are needed in rooms far from the windows and windowless spaces such as elevators, bathrooms and stairwells.
Skyscrapers can be artificially lit and the energy requirements can be covered by renewable energy or other electricity generation with low greenhouse gas emissions. Heating and cooling of skyscrapers can be efficient, because of centralized HVAC systems, heat radiation blocking windows and small surface area of the building. There is Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification for skyscrapers. For example, the Empire State Building received a gold Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design rating in September 2011 and the Empire State Building is the tallest LEED certified building in the United States, proving that skyscrapers can be environmentally friendly. The 30 St Mary Axe in London
London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...
, the United Kingdom is another example of an environmentally friendly skyscraper.
In the lower levels of a skyscraper a larger percentage of the building floor area must be devoted to the building structure and services than is required for lower buildings:
* More structure – because it must be stronger to support more floors above
* Skyscraper design and construction#The elevator conundrum, The elevator conundrum creates the need for more lift shafts—everyone comes in at the bottom and they all have to pass through the lower part of the building to get to the upper levels.
* Building services – power and water enter the building from below and have to pass through the lower levels to get to the upper levels.
In low-rise structures, the support rooms (chillers, transformers, boilers, pumps and air handling units) can be put in basements or roof space—areas which have low rental value. There is, however, a limit to how far this plant can be located from the area it serves. The farther away it is the larger the risers for ducts and pipes from this plant to the floors they serve and the more floor area these risers take. In practice this means that in highrise buildings this plant is located on 'plant levels' at intervals up the building.
Operational energy
The building sector accounts for approximately 50% of greenhouse gas emissions, with operational energy accounting for 80-90% of building related energy use. Operational energy use is affected by the magnitude of conduction between the interior and exterior, convection from infiltrating air, and radiation through Glazing (window), glazing. The extent to which these factors affect the operational energy vary depending on the microclimate of the skyscraper, with increased wind speeds as the height of the skyscraper increases, and a decrease in the Dry-bulb temperature, dry bulb temperature as the altitude increases. For example, when moving from 1.5 meters to 284 meters, the dry bulb temperature decreased by 1.85oC while the wind speeds increased from 2.46 meters per seconds to 7.75 meters per second, which led to a 2.4% decrease in summer cooling in reference to the Freedom Tower in New York City. However, for the same building it was found that the annual energy use intensity was 9.26% higher because of the lack of shading at high altitudes which increased the cooling loads for the remainder of the year while a combination of temperature, wind, shading, and the effects of reflections led to a combined 13.13% increase in annual energy use intensity. In a study performed by Leung and Ray in 2013, it was found that the average energy use intensity of a structure with between 0 and 9 floors was approximately 80 kBtu/ft/yr, while the energy use intensity of a structure with more than 50 floors was about 117 kBtu/ft/yr. Refer to Figure 1 to see the breakdown of how intermediate heights affect the energy use intensity. The slight decrease in energy use intensity over 30-39 floors can be attributed to the fact that the increase in pressure within the heating, cooling, and water distribution systems levels out at a point between 40 and 49 floors and the energy savings due to the microclimate of higher floors are able to be seen. There is a gap in data in which another study looking at the same information but for taller buildings is needed.
Elevators
A portion of the operational energy increase in tall buildings is related to the usage of elevators because the distance traveled and the speed at which they travel increases as the height of the building increases. Between 5 and 25% of the total energy consumed in a tall building is from the use of elevator
An elevator or lift is a cable-assisted, hydraulic cylinder-assisted, or roller-track assisted machine that vertically transports people or freight between floors, levels, or decks of a building, vessel, or other structure. They a ...
s. As the height of the building increases it is also more inefficient because of the presence of higher drag and friction losses.
Embodied energy
The embodied energy associated with the construction of skyscrapers varies based on the materials used. Embodied energy is quantified per unit of material. Skyscrapers inherently have higher embodied energy than low-rise buildings due to the increase in material used as more floors are built. Figures 2 and 3 compare the total embodied energy of different floor types and the unit embodied energy per floor type for buildings with between 20 and 70 stories. For all floor types except for steel-concrete floors, it was found that after 60 stories, there was a decrease in unit embodied energy but when considering all floors, there was exponential growth due to a double dependence on height. The first of which is the relationship between an increase in height leading to an increase in the quantity of materials used, and the second being the increase in height leading to an increase in size of elements to increase the structural capacity of the building. A careful choice in building materials can likely reduce the embodied energy without reducing the number of floors constructed within the bounds presented.
Embodied carbon
Similar to embodied energy, the Embodied carbon emissions, embodied carbon of a building is dependent on the materials chosen for its construction. Figures 4 and 5 show the total embodied carbon for different structure types for increasing numbers of stories and the embodied carbon per square meter of gross floor area for the same structure types as the number of stories increases. Both methods of measuring the embodied carbon show that there is a point where the embodied carbon is lowest before increasing again as the height increases. For the total embodied carbon it is dependent on the structure type, but is either around 40 stories, or approximately 60 stories. For the square meter of gross floor area, the lowest embodied carbon was found at either 40 stories, or approximately 70 stories.
Air pollution
In urban areas, the configuration of buildings can lead to exacerbated wind patterns and an uneven dispersion of pollutants. When the height of buildings surrounding a source of air pollution is increased, the size and occurrence of both "dead-zones" and "hotspots" were increased in areas where there were almost no pollutants and high concentrations of pollutants, respectively. Figure 6 depicts the progression of a Building F's height increasing from 0.0315 units in Case 1, to 0.2 units in Case 2, to 0.6 units in Case 3. This progression shows how as the height of Building F increases, the dispersion of pollutants decreases, but the concentration within the building cluster increases. The variation of velocity fields can be affected by the construction of new buildings as well, rather than solely the increase in height as shown in the figure. As urban centers continue to expand upward and outward, the present velocity fields will continue to trap polluted air close to the tall buildings within the city. Specifically within major cities, a majority of air pollution is derived from transportation, whether it be cars, trains, planes, or boats. As urban sprawl continues and pollutants continue to be emitted, the air pollutants will continue to be trapped within these urban centers. Different pollutants can be detrimental to human health in different ways. For example, Particulates, particulate matter from vehicular exhaust and power generation can cause asthma, bronchitis, and cancer, while nitrogen dioxide from motor engine combustion processes can cause neurological disfunction and asphyxiation.
LEED/green building rating
Like with all other buildings, if special measures are taken to incorporate sustainable design methods early on in the design process, it is possible to obtain a green building rating, such as a Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification. An integrated design approach is crucial in making sure that design decisions that positively impact the whole building are made at the beginning of the process. Because of the massive scale of skyscrapers, the decisions made by the design team must take all factors into account, including the buildings impact on the surrounding community, the effect of the building on the direction in which air and water move, and the impact of the construction process, must be taken into account. There are several design methods that could be employed in the construction of a skyscraper that would take advantage of the height of the building. The microclimates that exist as the height of the building increases can be taken advantage of to increase the Passive ventilation, natural ventilation, decrease the cooling load, and increase daylighting. Natural ventilation can be increased by utilizing the stack effect, in which warm air moves upward and increases the movement of the air within the building. If utilizing the stack effect, buildings must take extra care to design for fire separation techniques, as the stack effect can also exacerbate the severity of a fire. Skyscrapers are considered to be internally dominated buildings because of their size as well as the fact that a majority are used as some sort of office building with high cooling loads. Due to the microclimate created at the upper floors with the increased wind speed and the decreased dry bulb temperatures, the cooling load will naturally be reduced because of infiltration through the thermal envelope. By taking advantage of the naturally cooler temperatures at higher altitudes, skyscrapers can reduce their cooling loads passively. On the other side of this argument, is the lack of shading at higher altitudes by other buildings, so the solar heat gain will be larger for higher floors than for floors at the lower end of the building. Special measures should be taken to shade upper floors from sunlight during the overheated period to ensure thermal comfort without increasing the cooling load.
History of the tallest skyscrapers
At the beginning of the 20th century, New York City was a center for the Beaux-Arts architecture, Beaux-Arts architectural movement, attracting the talents of such great architects as Stanford White and Carrere and Hastings. As better construction and engineering technology became available as the century progressed, New York City and Chicago became the focal point of the competition for the tallest building in the world. Each city's striking skyline has been composed of numerous and varied skyscrapers, many of which are icons of 20th-century architecture:
* The E. V. Haughwout Building in Manhattan was the first building to successfully install a passenger elevator, doing so on 23 March 1857.
* The Equitable Life Building in Manhattan was the first office building to feature passenger elevators.
* The Home Insurance Building
The Home Insurance Building was a skyscraper that stood in Chicago from 1885 to 1931. Originally ten stories and tall, it was designed by William Le Baron Jenney in 1884 and completed the next year. Two floors were added in 1891, bringing its ...
in Chicago, which was built in 1884, was the first tall building with a steel skeleton.
* The Singer Building, an expansion to an existing structure in Lower Manhattan was the world's tallest building when completed in 1908. Designed by Ernest Flagg, it was tall.
* The Metropolitan Life Insurance Company Tower, across Madison Square Park from the Flatiron Building, was the world's tallest building when completed in 1909. It was designed by the architectural firm of Napoleon LeBrun & Sons and stood tall.
* The Woolworth Building, a neo-Gothic "Cathedral of Commerce" overlooking New York City Hall, was designed by Cass Gilbert. At 792 feet (241 m), it became the world's tallest building upon its completion in 1913, an honor it retained until 1930.
* 40 Wall Street, a 71-story, Gothic Revival architecture, neo-Gothic tower designed by H. Craig Severance, was the world's tallest building for a month in May 1930.
* The Chrysler Building in New York City took the lead in late May 1930 as the tallest building in the world, reaching 1,046 feet (319 m). Designed by William Van Alen, an Art Deco style masterpiece with an exterior crafted of brick, the Chrysler Building continues to be a favorite of New Yorkers to this day.
* The Empire State Building, nine streets south of the Chrysler in Manhattan, topped out at 1,250 feet (381 m) and 102 stories in 1931. The first building to have more than 100 floors, it was designed by Shreve, Lamb and Harmon in the contemporary Art Deco style and takes its name from the List of U.S. state nicknames, nickname of New York State. The antenna mast added in 1951 brought pinnacle height to 1,472 feet (449 m), lowered in 1984 to 1,454 feet (443 m).
* The World Trade Center (1973–2001), World Trade Center officially surpassed the Empire State Building in 1970, was completed in 1973, and consisted of two tall towers and several smaller buildings. For a short time the World Trade Center's North Tower―completed in 1972―was the world's tallest building, until surpassed by Willis Tower, Sears Tower in 1973. Upon completion, the towers stood for 28 years, until the September 11 attacks destroyed the buildings in 2001.
* The Willis Tower (formerly Sears Tower) was completed in 1974. It was the first building to employ the "Tube (structure), bundled tube" structural system, designed by Fazlur Khan. It was surpassed in height by the Petronas Towers in 1998, but remained the tallest in some categories until Burj Khalifa surpassed it in all categories in 2010. It is currently the second tallest building in the United States, after One World Trade Center, which was built to replace the destroyed Trade Towers.
Momentum in setting records passed from the United States to other nations with the opening of the Petronas Twin Towers in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, in 1998. The record for the world's tallest building has remained in Asia since the opening of Taipei 101 in Taipei, Taiwan, in 2004. A number of architectural records, including those of the world's tallest building and tallest free-standing structure, moved to the Middle East with the opening of the Burj Khalifa in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.
This geographical transition is accompanied by a change in approach to skyscraper design. For much of the 20th century large buildings took the form of simple geometrical shapes. This reflected the "international style" or Modern architecture, modernist philosophy shaped by Bauhaus architects early in the century. The last of these, the Willis Tower and World Trade Center towers in New York, erected in the 1970s, reflect the philosophy. Tastes shifted in the decade which followed, and new skyscrapers began to exhibit Postmodernism, postmodernist influences. This approach to design avails itself of historical elements, often adapted and re-interpreted, in creating technologically modern structures. The Petronas Twin Towers recall Asian pagoda architecture and Islamic geometric principles. Taipei 101 likewise reflects the pagoda tradition as it incorporates ancient Motif (visual arts), motifs such as the Ruyi (scepter), ruyi symbol. The Burj Khalifa draws inspiration from traditional Islamic art. Architects in recent years have sought to create structures that would not appear equally at home if set in any part of the world, but that reflect the culture thriving in the spot where they stand.
The following list measures height of the roof, not the pinnacle. The more common gauge is the "highest architectural detail"; such ranking would have included Petronas Towers, built in 1996.
Gallery
File:World Trade Center, New York City - aerial view (March 2001) (modified version with desaturated towers).jpg, The original World Trade Center (1973–2001), 1 World Trade Center was the world's tallest building from 1971 to 1973
File:Sear's Tower 3.jpg, The Willis Tower in Chicago was the world's tallest building from 1974 to 1998
File:The Twins SE Asia 2019 (49171985716) (cropped) 2.jpg, The Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur were the tallest from 1998 to 2004.
File:Taipei 101 in 2019.jpg, Taipei 101 in Taipei, the world's tallest skyscraper from 2004 to 2010, was the first to exceed the 500-m mark.
Future developments
Proposals for such structures have been put forward, including the Burj Mubarak Al Kabir in Kuwait and Azerbaijan Tower in Baku. Kilometer-plus structures present architectural challenges that may eventually place them in a new architectural category. The first building under construction and planned to be over one kilometre tall is the Jeddah Tower.
Wooden skyscrapers
Several wooden skyscraper designs have been designed and built. A 14-storey housing project in Bergen, Bergen, Norway known as 'Treet' or 'The Tree' became the world's tallest wooden apartment block when it was completed in late 2015. The Tree's record was eclipsed by Brock Commons, an 18-storey wooden dormitory at the University of British Columbia in Canada, when it was completed in September 2016.
A 40-storey residential building 'Trätoppen' has been proposed by architect Anders Berensson to be built in Stockholm, Stockholm, Sweden. Trätoppen would be the tallest building in Stockholm, though there are no immediate plans to begin construction. The tallest currently-planned wooden skyscraper is the 70-storey W350 Project in Tokyo, to be built by the Japanese wood products company Sumitomo Forestry Co. to celebrate its 350th anniversary in 2041. An 80-storey wooden skyscraper, the River Beech Tower, has been proposed by a team including architects Perkins + Will and the University of Cambridge. The River Beech Tower, on the banks of the Chicago River in Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, would be 348 feet shorter than the W350 Project despite having 10 more storeys.
Wooden skyscrapers are estimated to be around a quarter of the weight of an equivalent Reinforced concrete, reinforced-concrete structure as well as reducing the building carbon footprint by 60–75%. Buildings have been designed using Cross laminated timber, cross-laminated timber (CLT) which gives a higher rigidity and strength to wooden structures. CLT panels are prefabricated and can therefore save on building time.
See also
* CTBUH Skyscraper Award
* Emporis Skyscraper Award
* Groundscraper
* List of cities with the most skyscrapers
* List of tallest buildings
* List of tallest buildings and structures
* Plyscraper
* Seascraper
* Skyscraper design and construction
* Skyscraper Index
* Skyscraper Museum in NYC
* Skyscrapers in film
* Skyline
* Vertical farming, "farmscrapers"
* World's littlest skyscraper
* Drag coefficient, drag-coefficient
* Fatigue (material), material-fatigue
* Downforce, down-force
* Steel frame
References
Further reading
*
*Judith Dupré. ''Skyscrapers: A History of the World's Most Extraordinary Buildings-Revised and Updated.'' (2013). Hachette/Black Dog & Leventhal. 2013 ed.:
*''Skyscrapers: Form and Function'', by David Bennett, Simon & Schuster, 1995.
*
* Willis, Carol, ''Form Follows Finance: Skyscrapers and Skylines in New York and Chicago''. Princeton Architectural Press, 1995. 224 P.
* Van Leeuwen, Thomas A P, ''The Skyward Trend of Thought: The Metaphysics of the American Skyscraper'', Cambridge: MIT Press, 1988.
External links
*
Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat
SkyscraperCity
construction updates magazine
Skyscraper definition on Phorio Standards
Skyscraper Museum
SkyscraperPage
Technical information and diagrams
{{Authority control
Skyscrapers,
Structural engineering
Structural system
Articles containing video clips
Building types