Research
09 April 2020
Chicago Building Code Modernization: Energy Performance and Sustainability Implications
Oliver Baumann & Ajit V. Naik, Baumann Consulting
This paper reviews the changes between the Chicago Building Code (CBC) and International Building Code (IBC)'s updated and previous versions to assist project teams in...
09 April 2020
Chicago Building Code Modernization: Comparison of Prototype Building Designs
John Viise & Matthew Cummins & Alberto Guarise & Daniel Koch, DeSimone Consulting Engineers
This paper develops three prototype buildings that would be subject to the new structural standards, all of which can use prescriptive code provisions for reference....
09 April 2020
Chicago Building Code Modernization: Implications for High-Rise Safety
Erik Harris, Goettsch Partners
This paper studies the ways in which the CBC will affect some basic elements of the schematic floor plan and design for a high-rise office...
09 April 2020
Chicago Building Code Modernization: Implications for Tenant Remodels in High-Rise Buildings
Lori Chandler, Epstein
This paper intends to analyze the application of the new Chicago Building Code (CBC) to a typical tenant remodel of a business occupancy in a...
19 March 2020
Chicago Building Code Modernization: Comparison of Prototype Building Designs
John Viise & Matthew Cummins & Alberto Guarise & Daniel Koch, DeSimone Consulting Engineers
This research paper, an abridged version of a white paper produced by the Chicago Chapter of the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat (CTBUH),...
11 October 2019
On the 50th anniversary of the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat’s founding, the CTBUH 10th World Congress returns to the Council’s home: Chicago....
11 October 2019
A New View, and a New Gateway, for Chicago
Jeanne Gang & Juliane Wolf, Studio Gang
Upon completion, Vista Tower will become Chicago’s third tallest building, topping out the Lakeshore East development, where the Chicago River meets Lake Michigan. Occupying a...
21 June 2019
Social Media and Popular Places: The Case of Chicago
Kheir Al-Kodmany, University of Illinois at Chicago
This paper offers new ways to learn about popular places in the city. Using locational data from Social Media platforms platforms, including Twitter, Facebook, and...
31 January 2019
How Do Outdoor Pollutant Concentrations Vary Along the Height of a Tall Building?
Dr. Brent Stephens & Dr. Parham Azimi, Illinois Institute of Technology; Luke Leung, Skidmore, Owings & Merrill LLP
It is generally assumed that vertical pollutant dispersion can reduce exposures to ambient pollutants in tall buildings, as concentrations of some ground-source pollutants are diluted...
01 September 2018
Developments of Structural Systems Toward Mile-High Towers
Kyoung Sun Moon, Yale University School of Architecture
Tall buildings which began from about 40 m tall office towers in the late 19th century have evolved into mixed-use megatall towers over 800 m....
01 March 2018
Kyoung Sun Moon, Yale University School of Architecture
The emergence of tall buildings in the late 19th century was possible by using new materials and separating the role of structures and that of...
01 March 2018
A Tall Building Ethos of Integration
Brian Lee, Skidmore, Owings & Merrill
The last decade has seen great design opportunities for tall building construction around the globe. The best designs represent a new generation of skyscrapers that...
01 March 2018
Designing the High-Rise Building from the Inside/Out
Timothy Johnson & Jonathan Ward, NBBJ
For over 100 years, the tall building has largely advanced in technological innovation; however very little has been done in the terms of understanding the...
05 February 2018
The Global Tall Building Picture: Impact of 2017
In 2017, 144 buildings of 200 meters’ height or greater were completed. This is the fourth record-breaking year in a row, and it brings the...
Tim Griffith for KPF.jpg)
05 February 2018
2017: Skyscraper History’s Tallest, Highest- Volume, and Most Geographically Diverse Year
This 2017 Tall Building Year in Review / Tall Buildings in Numbers data analysis report shows that more buildings of 200 meters’ height or greater...
01 February 2018
The Global Tall Building Picture: Impact of 2017
CTBUH Staff, CTBUH
In 2017, 144 buildings of 200 meters’ height or greater were completed. This is the fourth record-breaking year in a row, and it brings the...
01 December 2017
Robert S. Best, JLL
Employers are realizing that workplaces have an immense impact on productivity. And, because people typically represent about 90% of a company’s costs, even a slight...
01 December 2017
Craig Burton, Interface Engineering, Inc.
The design and construction of supertall buildings has grown dramatically in recent years. This area of practice has traditionally fallen within the purview of a...
01 December 2017
Juan Betancur, Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill Architecture
This paper outlines the processes and strategies studied and selected by the team during the design stages of the project for the incorporation of BIPV...
01 December 2017
John Peronto, Thornton Tomasetti
A modern and highly-sustainable addition to the skyline of Seoul, South Korea has been completed; the Federation of Korean Industries Headquarters (FKI). The signature saw-toothed...
01 December 2017
The Path to Life Cycle Carbon Neutrality in High Rise Buildings
Chris Drew & Natalia Quintanilla, Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill Architecture
Across the world, building energy codes are becoming stricter, demanding higher levels of energy performance with each issuance. Some locations have taken initiatives to eliminate...
Rune__Abrahamsen.jpg)
30 October 2017
Rethinking CTBUH Height Criteria In the Context of Tall Timber
Robert M. Foster, University of Queensland; Michael H. Ramage, University of Cambridge; Thomas Reynolds, The University of Edinburgh
Recent developments in the design and construction of progressively taller buildings using engineered timber as a structural material raise important questions about the language that...
08 August 2017
Jeanne Gang, Studio Gang Architects
Having designed the 262-meter Aqua in Chicago, which completed in 2009, Jeanne Gang, principal and founder of Studio Gang Architects, received considerable attention for what...
08 August 2017
Ten Significant Tall Buildings, and the Significant Women Behind Them
Leading Women in Tall Buildings
Recently, there has been a growing and overdue recognition in the architecture discipline that women are under-represented, not just in terms of leadership positions held,...
02 June 2017
Dense Downtown vs. Suburban Dispersed: A Pilot Study on Urban Sustainability
Antony Wood & Peng Du, Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat
This paper presents the initial findings of a ground-breaking two-year CTBUH-funded research project investigating the real environmental and social sustainability of people’s lifestyles in a...
28 April 2017
Debating Tall: Replace the Thomson Center?
Helmut Jahn, JAHN; Mir Ali, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Chicago’s drum-shaped, 17-story James R. Thompson Center, with its soaring atrium and extensive glazing, has been criticized for poor temperature control and spatial inefficiency, and...
20 April 2017
River Beech Tower: A Tall Timber Experiment
Jeff Sanner & Todd Snapp, Perkins+Will; Alejandro Fernandez, Thornton Tomasetti; et al.
The Chicago River Beech Tower is a collaborative research effort with the goal of identifying challenges and opportunities associated with designing increasingly tall mass timber...
01 March 2017
Vertical Shortening Considerations in the 1 km Tall Jeddah Tower
John Peronto, Robert Sinn & Matthew Huizinga, Thornton Tomasetti
Jeddah Tower will be the first man-made structure to reach a kilometer in height upon its completion in 2019. From conception, it was clear that...
17 October 2016
Dense Downtown vs. Suburban Dispersed: A Pilot Study on Urban Sustainability
Antony Wood & Peng Du, Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat
This paper presents the initial findings of a ground-breaking two-year CTBUH-funded research project investigating the real environmental and social sustainability of people’s lifestyles in a...
17 October 2016
Sustainable Integration of Tall Buildings and the Urban Habitat for the Megacities of the Future
Mark Lavery, BuroHappold Engineering
Tall buildings increasingly dominate our skylines as an almost inevitable response to urbanisation. They often do not integrate well with the urban habitat in which...
17 October 2016
The Space Between: Urban Spaces Surrounding Tall Buildings
James Parakh, City of Toronto Planning Division
This paper is intended to introduce the upcoming CTBUH technical guide titled “The Space Between,” which investigates the importance of publicly accessible spaces surrounding tall...
17 October 2016
From Icon to Community: The Repositioning of the Mega Tower in the City Context
Bryant Lu & Guymo Wong, Ronald Lu & Partners
Historically, mega-towers were frequently labelled “egocentric displays of power,” becoming iconic symbols of a city or an individual. In today’s age of global hyper-urbanization, supertall...
17 October 2016
Façade Construction in China: Journey to Lean Design
Allan Chung, Gensler; Ivan Mutis, Illinois Institute of Technology
There is a recent trend in the construction industry to implement “lean concepts,” a management strategy based upon the Toyota Production System philosophy. While the...
17 October 2016
Remodel, Recycle or Rebuild? - Addressing the Fire Safety Challenges of Repurposing Skyscrapers
Simon Lay, Olsson Fire & Risk
Some of our established world cities are already facing the challenge of older tall building stock that is no longer relevant to the most commercially...
NasirKhanSaikat.jpg)
17 October 2016
Daniel Safarik, Shawn Ursini & Antony Wood; Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat
The rise of the megacity presents unprecedented opportunities to understand the human urbanization phenomenon, and to observe the effects of multicore, polycentric cities growing together...
17 October 2016
Megacities: Design Challenges and Responses
Scott Duncan & Philip Enquist, Skidmore Owings & Merrill LLP
As this issue and the International Conference are focused on the megacity phenomenon, this edition of Talking Tall features two people who have designed tall...
28 July 2016
Debating Tall: Should Tall Buildings be Demolished For Non-Safety Reasons?
Arthur Wellington, Thornton Tomasetti; Girish Dravid, Sterling Engineering
In several developing nations recently, skyscrapers were found to have been constructed in violation of local laws, and have been ordered demolished. In some cases,...
01 June 2016
A Whole LCA of the Sustainable Aspects of Structural Systems in Tall Buildings
Dario Trabucco, IUAV University of Venice; Antony Wood, Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat; Olivier Vassart & Nicoletta Popa, ArcelorMittal
This paper summarizes the results of a two-year-long research project conducted by the CTBUH on the life cycle assessment (LCA) of tall building structural systems....
01 June 2016
Three Points of the Residential High-Rise: Designing for Social Connectivity
Jeanne Gang, Studio Gang Architects
In this paper we discuss the terms “exo-spatial design,” “solar carving,” and “bridging” as strategies for creating more socially connective tall buildings. As a typology,...
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28 April 2016
Challenges and Opportunities in Vertical Healthcare Design
Douglas King, VOA Associates
Vertical healthcare design is an emerging field with its own particular set of benefits and challenges. This building type will become more desirable and popular,...
26 October 2015
The Tall Building Impact: From Local to Global
Adrian Smith & Peter Weismantle, Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill Architecture
AS+GG’s Director of Supertall Technology interviews AS+GG Partner Adrian Smith about the impact that supertall buildings have on a city’s identity, economy, ecological impact, and...
26 October 2015
A Whole Life Cycle Assessment of the Sustainable Aspects of Structural Systems in Tall Buildings
Dario Trabucco & Antony Wood, Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat; Olivier Vassart & Nicoletta Popa, ArcelorMittal
During a dedicated two-year-long research effort, the CTBUH analyzed all life phases of a tall building’s structural system: the extraction and production of its materials,...
26 October 2015
FaçadeRetrofit.org: An Online Database Resource for the Façade Renovation of Existing Buildings
Andrea Martinez, Karen M. Kensek & Douglas Noble, University of Southern California; Mic Patterson, Enclos Corp.
Much of the existing tall building stock is burdened with aging and underperforming façades, resulting in opportunities to substantially improve building performance through façade retrofit....
26 October 2015
Three Points of the Residential High-Rise: Designing for Social Connectivity
Jeanne Gang, Studio Gang Architects
In this paper we discuss the terms “exo-spatial design,” “solar carving,” and “bridging” as strategies for creating more socially connective tall buildings. As a typology,...
26 October 2015
Rags to Riches: How Chicago’s 111 West Wacker Finally Got Built
Gary Handel & Stephen Matkovitz
With 25 floors and 40,000 cubic yards of concrete in place, 111 West Wacker stood for nearly 4 years on its prominent Chicago River site...
26 October 2015
The Network of Urban Spaces Surrounding Tall Buildings
James Parakh, City of Toronto Planning Department
This paper investigates the Network of Urban Spaces Surrounding Tall Buildings, the Tall Building as Place Makers how Tall Buildings meet the street. As contributing...
26 October 2015
Urban Open Space - A Tower in the Park and a Park in the Tower
James Goettsch, Goettsch Partners
In urban centers dominated by tall buildings, access to outdoor space is important. We will explain how two urban office building developments provide valuable outdoor...
26 October 2015
Global Cyclical Resurgence and Clustering of Office Skyscrapers
Sofia Dermisi, University of Washington
Skyscraper development has been linked with financial extremes; this paper explores this relationship by analyzing global construction trends for office skyscrapers with a height of...
26 October 2015
Michael F. Kaufman, Goettsch Partners
GP was selected to Renovate or Adapt “The” prime corners of Michigan Avenue on both sides of the Chicago River, all within a two year...
26 October 2015
It’s Not About the Skyline, It’s About the Base Condition
Terri Boake, University of Waterloo
The rapid densification of cities is a fairly recent phenomenon and seems in many cases to be progressing without regard to important already established urban...
24 August 2015
World’s Highest Observation Decks
CTBUH Research
Perhaps no element of a tall building is more closely related to the pure pleasure of standing high in the sky and taking in the...
28 January 2015
Debating Tall: Tall Timber in 10 Years?
Carsten Hein, Arup; Carl Baldassarra, Wiss, Janney, Elstner Associates
Interest is growing in using wood as a building material for skyscrapers. Several 10-story-plus buildings have been constructed, and numerous academic, industry, and government research...
31 December 2014
Year in Review: Tall Trends of 2014
Daniel Safarik, Antony Wood, Marty Carver & Marshall Gerometta, CTBUH
An All-Time Record 97 Buildings of 200 Meters or Higher Completed in 2014 and 2014 showed further shifts towards Asia, and also surprising developments in...
06 November 2014
Dream Deferred: Unfinished Tall Buildings
CTBUH Research
Without big dreams, there would be no tall buildings. Conceiving, financing, designing, and constructing a skyscraper is no simple feat, even under the best of...
16 September 2014
Peng Du & Antony Wood, CTBUH
It is widely accepted that the concentration of people in denser cities – sharing space, infrastructure, and facilities – offers much greater energy efficiency than...
28 July 2014
Debating Tall: Is There a Height Threshold For Optimum Sustainability?
Jason McLennan, International Living Future Institute; Antony Wood, CTBUH
As increased density has become more accepted as necessity, the scale of that density is still under debate. Thus we ask, “Is the threshold for...
28 April 2014
Debating Tall: Should Tall Buildings in Cold Climates be Designed Specifically to Stop Falling Ice?
Michael Carter & Roman Stangl, Northern Microclimate
Recent media attention in major urban centers such as New York City and Chicago has brought the issue of falling ice from tall buildings to...
01 February 2014
Skyscrapers and Skylines: New York and Chicago, 1885–2007
Jason Barr, Rutgers University
This paper investigates skyscraper competition between New York City and Chicago from 1885 to 2007. Skyscraper rivalry between these cities is part of US historiography,...
28 January 2014
Debating Tall: Antennas vs. Spires
Larry Silverstein, Siliverstein Properties Inc.; Dario Trabucco, IUAV University of Venice
The CTBUH’s Height Committee ratified the architectural height of One World Trade Center last November, touching off massive media coverage and opening up complicated mixed...
07 November 2013
The Monadnock Building, Technically Reconsidered
Thomas Leslie, Iowa State University
Far from being the world’s last and largest “masonry skyscraper,” the Monadnock was a profoundly transitional structural achievement, making important advances in steel construction while...
01 February 2013
Creating a Vertical University in an Urban Environment
Christopher Groesbeck, VOA Associates
Multi-function universities in tall buildings are still a rarity, but they are growing more common as institutions look for efficient and cost-effective ways to serve...
21 September 2012
How Tall Buildings Meet the Ground is as Important as How They Meet the Sky
James Goettsch, Goettsch Partners
If you are concerned about the urban habitat, you have to be concerned about whether or not buildings provide a positive experience at the ground...
19 September 2012
Tall Buildings in Future Development of Metropolitan Universities
Christopher Groesbeck, VOA Associates; Jon DeVries & John McDonald, Roosevelt University; Ron Klemencic, MKA
In the future, the University will need to consider vertical models to co-exist within their urban cores and create a living and working balance. With...
19 September 2012
3 Environments, 3 Programs, 3 Solutions
Paul De Santis & Travis Soberg, Goettsch Partners
The effects of climate change, increased population, and lack of natural resources are global issues. As the world continues to consolidate into regional urban centers,...
27 January 2012
Debating Tall: A Supertall Future in the US?
Adrian Smith, Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill Architecture; Paul Beitler, Beitler Real Estate Services LLC
In 1990, only 11 buildings in the world could be counted as a “supertall” (defined as a building over 300 meters tall), and all but...
18 January 2012
A Future for Tall Building History
Raymond Hartshorne & Paul Alessandro, Hartshorne Plunkard Architecture
Looking at Chicago's or New York's skylines, one feature that sets apart the first skyscraper cities from the recent ones is the rich history of...
01 November 2011
Humanizing High-rise Urbanism: Design Strategies and Planning Tools
Vinayak Bharne, Moule & Polyzoides
From a global standpoint, the high-rise city remains a negotiated territory, a juggling act between private interests, political processes and public good. But while private...
10 October 2011
What Came First?... the Tall Building or the Urban Habitat
Robert M. Lau, CTBUH; Jon DeVries & John F. McDonald, Roosevelt University
This paper will examine the question, 'Did the Tall Building produce urban density or did the Urban Habitat of CBDs, with the creation of urban...
01 May 2011
The High Life: Residential Towers in Central Business Districts
Peter Noone, Gary Klompmaker & Crista Sumanik, Solomon Cordwell Buenz (SCB)
These buildings serve growing segments of the population who desire amenity-rich lifestyles and safe urban homes. They serve cities that desire significant real estate tax...
01 May 2011
From Eyesore to Urban Asset: The Transformation of Abandoned Railroad Structures in American Cities
Robert Lau, Roosevelt University
The high-line is a new 1.5-mile long public park built on an abandoned elevated railroad stretching from the Meatpacking District to the Hudson Rail Yards...
01 February 2011
Gerard Peet, Rotterdam University of Applied Sciences, The Netherlands
The modern skyscraper is generally considered to be an American invention. Chicago and New York claim they once hosted the world's first skyscraper and many...
31 December 2010
Tallest Buildings Completed in 2010
CTBUH Research
In a year dominated by news coverage of the new “World’s Tallest Building” – Burj Khalifa, Dubai – one may be surprised to learn that,...
01 August 2010
The High-rise as a Retirement Community
Bridget Lesniak & Robert Neper, Perkins + Will; Donald Hamlin, Thornton Tomasetti
As cities are becoming denser, the functions of high-rises are expanding. In addition, the central business district is no longer the exclusive region of the...
01 February 2010
Historical Evolution of the Service Core
Dario Trabucco, IUAV University of Venice, Italy
The service core is the distinctive feature of a tall building: it provides the skyscraper with structural solidity, room for elevators, and other amenities, and...
01 January 2010
Sustainability and the Tall Building: Recent Developments and Future Trends
Mir M. Ali & Paul Armstrong, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
As a major energy consumer, the tall building does not ordinarily conjure images of sustainable design. But a new generation of tall buildings is incorporating...
31 December 2009
Tallest Buildings Completed in 2009
CTBUH Research
Trump International Hotel & Tower named tallest building completed in 2009; Successful year for the American high-rise. Over half of all buildings 200m or taller...
01 August 2009
Case Study: Trump International Hotel & Tower
William Baker & Richard F. Tomlinson, SOM; Paul James, Bovis Lend Lease; Andrew Weiss, The Trump Organization
Chicago, a city known worldwide for its tall buildings, welcomed a new supertall tower to its skyline this year. Bookended by the 442-meter (1,450-foot) Sears...
01 February 2009
Tall Buildings in the Global Recession: 2008, 2020 and Beyond
Philip Oldfield & Antony Wood, CTBUH
The year 2008 will long be remembered as the start of an economic crisis that has gripped the entire globe - a year that may...
01 February 2009
Restoring Mies van der Rohe’s 860-880 Lake Shore Drive: When Less is Not Enough
Rico Cedro, Krueck & Sexton Architects
Mies van der Rohe's 860-880 Lake Shore Drive (1948-51) is one of the supreme monuments of modern architecture. With this pair of apartment buildings, Mies...
12 June 2008
The Tallest Buildings in the World: Past, Present & Future
CTBUH Research
Over time, the average height of the 100 tallest buildings in the world has been steadily increasing. However, by 2010, this average height will have...
09 June 2008
Toward a Better Urban Life: Integration of Cities and Tall Buildings
Mir M. Ali & Ajla Aksamija, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
In the context of a rapidly urbanizing world, architects and planners should aim to create cities that are thriving, vibrant, and healthy. Well-planned cities containing...
03 March 2008
The “International” Skyscraper: Observations
Georges Binder, Buildings & Data SA
While using tall buildings data, the following paper aims to show trends and shifts relating to building use and new locations accomodating high-rise buildings.
03 March 2008
Chicago: Building a Green City
Richard M. Daley & Sadhu Johnston, City of Chicago
Chicago has a tradition of innovation in architecture from balloon-frame houses to steel skyscrapers to today’s green buildings. Chicago was one of the first cities...
01 February 2008
The Race for the Sky: Unbuilt Skyscrapers
Mohamad Kashef, East Carolina University
Unbuilt skyscraper designs are noted by many architecture critics as the best in the genre of tall buildings. This paper provides an exposition of various...
01 February 2008
The “International” Skyscraper: Observations
Georges Binder, Buildings & Data SA
While using tall buildings data, the following paper aims to show trends and shifts relating to building use and new locations accommodating high-rise buildings. After...
20 October 2003
High-rise with Cable Net Facade for the 21st Century!
Abbas Aminmansour, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA
This article offers a synopsis of some of the unique features of the building and offers an insight into the collaboration between team members involved...
09 April 2020
Chicago Building Code Modernization: Energy Performance and Sustainability Implications
Oliver Baumann & Ajit V. Naik, Baumann Consulting
This paper reviews the changes between the Chicago Building Code (CBC) and International Building Code (IBC)'s updated and previous versions to assist project teams in...
09 April 2020
Chicago Building Code Modernization: Comparison of Prototype Building Designs
John Viise & Matthew Cummins & Alberto Guarise & Daniel Koch, DeSimone Consulting Engineers
This paper develops three prototype buildings that would be subject to the new structural standards, all of which can use prescriptive code provisions for reference....
09 April 2020
Chicago Building Code Modernization: Implications for High-Rise Safety
Erik Harris, Goettsch Partners
This paper studies the ways in which the CBC will affect some basic elements of the schematic floor plan and design for a high-rise office...
09 April 2020
Chicago Building Code Modernization: Implications for Tenant Remodels in High-Rise Buildings
Lori Chandler, Epstein
This paper intends to analyze the application of the new Chicago Building Code (CBC) to a typical tenant remodel of a business occupancy in a...
19 March 2020
Chicago Building Code Modernization: Comparison of Prototype Building Designs
John Viise & Matthew Cummins & Alberto Guarise & Daniel Koch, DeSimone Consulting Engineers
This research paper, an abridged version of a white paper produced by the Chicago Chapter of the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat (CTBUH),...
11 October 2019
On the 50th anniversary of the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat’s founding, the CTBUH 10th World Congress returns to the Council’s home: Chicago....
11 October 2019
A New View, and a New Gateway, for Chicago
Jeanne Gang & Juliane Wolf, Studio Gang
Upon completion, Vista Tower will become Chicago’s third tallest building, topping out the Lakeshore East development, where the Chicago River meets Lake Michigan. Occupying a...
21 June 2019
Social Media and Popular Places: The Case of Chicago
Kheir Al-Kodmany, University of Illinois at Chicago
This paper offers new ways to learn about popular places in the city. Using locational data from Social Media platforms platforms, including Twitter, Facebook, and...
31 January 2019
How Do Outdoor Pollutant Concentrations Vary Along the Height of a Tall Building?
Dr. Brent Stephens & Dr. Parham Azimi, Illinois Institute of Technology; Luke Leung, Skidmore, Owings & Merrill LLP
It is generally assumed that vertical pollutant dispersion can reduce exposures to ambient pollutants in tall buildings, as concentrations of some ground-source pollutants are diluted...
01 September 2018
Developments of Structural Systems Toward Mile-High Towers
Kyoung Sun Moon, Yale University School of Architecture
Tall buildings which began from about 40 m tall office towers in the late 19th century have evolved into mixed-use megatall towers over 800 m....
01 March 2018
Kyoung Sun Moon, Yale University School of Architecture
The emergence of tall buildings in the late 19th century was possible by using new materials and separating the role of structures and that of...
01 March 2018
A Tall Building Ethos of Integration
Brian Lee, Skidmore, Owings & Merrill
The last decade has seen great design opportunities for tall building construction around the globe. The best designs represent a new generation of skyscrapers that...
01 March 2018
Designing the High-Rise Building from the Inside/Out
Timothy Johnson & Jonathan Ward, NBBJ
For over 100 years, the tall building has largely advanced in technological innovation; however very little has been done in the terms of understanding the...
05 February 2018
The Global Tall Building Picture: Impact of 2017
In 2017, 144 buildings of 200 meters’ height or greater were completed. This is the fourth record-breaking year in a row, and it brings the...
05 February 2018
2017: Skyscraper History’s Tallest, Highest- Volume, and Most Geographically Diverse Year
This 2017 Tall Building Year in Review / Tall Buildings in Numbers data analysis report shows that more buildings of 200 meters’ height or greater...
01 February 2018
The Global Tall Building Picture: Impact of 2017
CTBUH Staff, CTBUH
In 2017, 144 buildings of 200 meters’ height or greater were completed. This is the fourth record-breaking year in a row, and it brings the...
01 December 2017
Robert S. Best, JLL
Employers are realizing that workplaces have an immense impact on productivity. And, because people typically represent about 90% of a company’s costs, even a slight...
01 December 2017
Craig Burton, Interface Engineering, Inc.
The design and construction of supertall buildings has grown dramatically in recent years. This area of practice has traditionally fallen within the purview of a...
01 December 2017
Juan Betancur, Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill Architecture
This paper outlines the processes and strategies studied and selected by the team during the design stages of the project for the incorporation of BIPV...
01 December 2017
John Peronto, Thornton Tomasetti
A modern and highly-sustainable addition to the skyline of Seoul, South Korea has been completed; the Federation of Korean Industries Headquarters (FKI). The signature saw-toothed...
01 December 2017
The Path to Life Cycle Carbon Neutrality in High Rise Buildings
Chris Drew & Natalia Quintanilla, Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill Architecture
Across the world, building energy codes are becoming stricter, demanding higher levels of energy performance with each issuance. Some locations have taken initiatives to eliminate...
30 October 2017
Rethinking CTBUH Height Criteria In the Context of Tall Timber
Robert M. Foster, University of Queensland; Michael H. Ramage, University of Cambridge; Thomas Reynolds, The University of Edinburgh
Recent developments in the design and construction of progressively taller buildings using engineered timber as a structural material raise important questions about the language that...
08 August 2017
Jeanne Gang, Studio Gang Architects
Having designed the 262-meter Aqua in Chicago, which completed in 2009, Jeanne Gang, principal and founder of Studio Gang Architects, received considerable attention for what...
08 August 2017
Ten Significant Tall Buildings, and the Significant Women Behind Them
Leading Women in Tall Buildings
Recently, there has been a growing and overdue recognition in the architecture discipline that women are under-represented, not just in terms of leadership positions held,...
02 June 2017
Dense Downtown vs. Suburban Dispersed: A Pilot Study on Urban Sustainability
Antony Wood & Peng Du, Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat
This paper presents the initial findings of a ground-breaking two-year CTBUH-funded research project investigating the real environmental and social sustainability of people’s lifestyles in a...
28 April 2017
Debating Tall: Replace the Thomson Center?
Helmut Jahn, JAHN; Mir Ali, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Chicago’s drum-shaped, 17-story James R. Thompson Center, with its soaring atrium and extensive glazing, has been criticized for poor temperature control and spatial inefficiency, and...
20 April 2017
River Beech Tower: A Tall Timber Experiment
Jeff Sanner & Todd Snapp, Perkins+Will; Alejandro Fernandez, Thornton Tomasetti; et al.
The Chicago River Beech Tower is a collaborative research effort with the goal of identifying challenges and opportunities associated with designing increasingly tall mass timber...
01 March 2017
Vertical Shortening Considerations in the 1 km Tall Jeddah Tower
John Peronto, Robert Sinn & Matthew Huizinga, Thornton Tomasetti
Jeddah Tower will be the first man-made structure to reach a kilometer in height upon its completion in 2019. From conception, it was clear that...
17 October 2016
Dense Downtown vs. Suburban Dispersed: A Pilot Study on Urban Sustainability
Antony Wood & Peng Du, Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat
This paper presents the initial findings of a ground-breaking two-year CTBUH-funded research project investigating the real environmental and social sustainability of people’s lifestyles in a...
17 October 2016
Sustainable Integration of Tall Buildings and the Urban Habitat for the Megacities of the Future
Mark Lavery, BuroHappold Engineering
Tall buildings increasingly dominate our skylines as an almost inevitable response to urbanisation. They often do not integrate well with the urban habitat in which...
17 October 2016
The Space Between: Urban Spaces Surrounding Tall Buildings
James Parakh, City of Toronto Planning Division
This paper is intended to introduce the upcoming CTBUH technical guide titled “The Space Between,” which investigates the importance of publicly accessible spaces surrounding tall...
17 October 2016
From Icon to Community: The Repositioning of the Mega Tower in the City Context
Bryant Lu & Guymo Wong, Ronald Lu & Partners
Historically, mega-towers were frequently labelled “egocentric displays of power,” becoming iconic symbols of a city or an individual. In today’s age of global hyper-urbanization, supertall...
17 October 2016
Façade Construction in China: Journey to Lean Design
Allan Chung, Gensler; Ivan Mutis, Illinois Institute of Technology
There is a recent trend in the construction industry to implement “lean concepts,” a management strategy based upon the Toyota Production System philosophy. While the...
17 October 2016
Remodel, Recycle or Rebuild? - Addressing the Fire Safety Challenges of Repurposing Skyscrapers
Simon Lay, Olsson Fire & Risk
Some of our established world cities are already facing the challenge of older tall building stock that is no longer relevant to the most commercially...
17 October 2016
Daniel Safarik, Shawn Ursini & Antony Wood; Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat
The rise of the megacity presents unprecedented opportunities to understand the human urbanization phenomenon, and to observe the effects of multicore, polycentric cities growing together...
17 October 2016
Megacities: Design Challenges and Responses
Scott Duncan & Philip Enquist, Skidmore Owings & Merrill LLP
As this issue and the International Conference are focused on the megacity phenomenon, this edition of Talking Tall features two people who have designed tall...
28 July 2016
Debating Tall: Should Tall Buildings be Demolished For Non-Safety Reasons?
Arthur Wellington, Thornton Tomasetti; Girish Dravid, Sterling Engineering
In several developing nations recently, skyscrapers were found to have been constructed in violation of local laws, and have been ordered demolished. In some cases,...
01 June 2016
A Whole LCA of the Sustainable Aspects of Structural Systems in Tall Buildings
Dario Trabucco, IUAV University of Venice; Antony Wood, Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat; Olivier Vassart & Nicoletta Popa, ArcelorMittal
This paper summarizes the results of a two-year-long research project conducted by the CTBUH on the life cycle assessment (LCA) of tall building structural systems....
01 June 2016
Three Points of the Residential High-Rise: Designing for Social Connectivity
Jeanne Gang, Studio Gang Architects
In this paper we discuss the terms “exo-spatial design,” “solar carving,” and “bridging” as strategies for creating more socially connective tall buildings. As a typology,...
28 April 2016
Challenges and Opportunities in Vertical Healthcare Design
Douglas King, VOA Associates
Vertical healthcare design is an emerging field with its own particular set of benefits and challenges. This building type will become more desirable and popular,...
26 October 2015
The Tall Building Impact: From Local to Global
Adrian Smith & Peter Weismantle, Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill Architecture
AS+GG’s Director of Supertall Technology interviews AS+GG Partner Adrian Smith about the impact that supertall buildings have on a city’s identity, economy, ecological impact, and...
26 October 2015
A Whole Life Cycle Assessment of the Sustainable Aspects of Structural Systems in Tall Buildings
Dario Trabucco & Antony Wood, Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat; Olivier Vassart & Nicoletta Popa, ArcelorMittal
During a dedicated two-year-long research effort, the CTBUH analyzed all life phases of a tall building’s structural system: the extraction and production of its materials,...
26 October 2015
FaçadeRetrofit.org: An Online Database Resource for the Façade Renovation of Existing Buildings
Andrea Martinez, Karen M. Kensek & Douglas Noble, University of Southern California; Mic Patterson, Enclos Corp.
Much of the existing tall building stock is burdened with aging and underperforming façades, resulting in opportunities to substantially improve building performance through façade retrofit....
26 October 2015
Three Points of the Residential High-Rise: Designing for Social Connectivity
Jeanne Gang, Studio Gang Architects
In this paper we discuss the terms “exo-spatial design,” “solar carving,” and “bridging” as strategies for creating more socially connective tall buildings. As a typology,...
26 October 2015
Rags to Riches: How Chicago’s 111 West Wacker Finally Got Built
Gary Handel & Stephen Matkovitz
With 25 floors and 40,000 cubic yards of concrete in place, 111 West Wacker stood for nearly 4 years on its prominent Chicago River site...
26 October 2015
The Network of Urban Spaces Surrounding Tall Buildings
James Parakh, City of Toronto Planning Department
This paper investigates the Network of Urban Spaces Surrounding Tall Buildings, the Tall Building as Place Makers how Tall Buildings meet the street. As contributing...
26 October 2015
Urban Open Space - A Tower in the Park and a Park in the Tower
James Goettsch, Goettsch Partners
In urban centers dominated by tall buildings, access to outdoor space is important. We will explain how two urban office building developments provide valuable outdoor...
26 October 2015
Global Cyclical Resurgence and Clustering of Office Skyscrapers
Sofia Dermisi, University of Washington
Skyscraper development has been linked with financial extremes; this paper explores this relationship by analyzing global construction trends for office skyscrapers with a height of...
26 October 2015
Michael F. Kaufman, Goettsch Partners
GP was selected to Renovate or Adapt “The” prime corners of Michigan Avenue on both sides of the Chicago River, all within a two year...
26 October 2015
It’s Not About the Skyline, It’s About the Base Condition
Terri Boake, University of Waterloo
The rapid densification of cities is a fairly recent phenomenon and seems in many cases to be progressing without regard to important already established urban...
24 August 2015
World’s Highest Observation Decks
CTBUH Research
Perhaps no element of a tall building is more closely related to the pure pleasure of standing high in the sky and taking in the...
28 January 2015
Debating Tall: Tall Timber in 10 Years?
Carsten Hein, Arup; Carl Baldassarra, Wiss, Janney, Elstner Associates
Interest is growing in using wood as a building material for skyscrapers. Several 10-story-plus buildings have been constructed, and numerous academic, industry, and government research...
31 December 2014
Year in Review: Tall Trends of 2014
Daniel Safarik, Antony Wood, Marty Carver & Marshall Gerometta, CTBUH
An All-Time Record 97 Buildings of 200 Meters or Higher Completed in 2014 and 2014 showed further shifts towards Asia, and also surprising developments in...
06 November 2014
Dream Deferred: Unfinished Tall Buildings
CTBUH Research
Without big dreams, there would be no tall buildings. Conceiving, financing, designing, and constructing a skyscraper is no simple feat, even under the best of...
16 September 2014
Peng Du & Antony Wood, CTBUH
It is widely accepted that the concentration of people in denser cities – sharing space, infrastructure, and facilities – offers much greater energy efficiency than...
28 July 2014
Debating Tall: Is There a Height Threshold For Optimum Sustainability?
Jason McLennan, International Living Future Institute; Antony Wood, CTBUH
As increased density has become more accepted as necessity, the scale of that density is still under debate. Thus we ask, “Is the threshold for...
28 April 2014
Debating Tall: Should Tall Buildings in Cold Climates be Designed Specifically to Stop Falling Ice?
Michael Carter & Roman Stangl, Northern Microclimate
Recent media attention in major urban centers such as New York City and Chicago has brought the issue of falling ice from tall buildings to...
01 February 2014
Skyscrapers and Skylines: New York and Chicago, 1885–2007
Jason Barr, Rutgers University
This paper investigates skyscraper competition between New York City and Chicago from 1885 to 2007. Skyscraper rivalry between these cities is part of US historiography,...
28 January 2014
Debating Tall: Antennas vs. Spires
Larry Silverstein, Siliverstein Properties Inc.; Dario Trabucco, IUAV University of Venice
The CTBUH’s Height Committee ratified the architectural height of One World Trade Center last November, touching off massive media coverage and opening up complicated mixed...
07 November 2013
The Monadnock Building, Technically Reconsidered
Thomas Leslie, Iowa State University
Far from being the world’s last and largest “masonry skyscraper,” the Monadnock was a profoundly transitional structural achievement, making important advances in steel construction while...
01 February 2013
Creating a Vertical University in an Urban Environment
Christopher Groesbeck, VOA Associates
Multi-function universities in tall buildings are still a rarity, but they are growing more common as institutions look for efficient and cost-effective ways to serve...
21 September 2012
How Tall Buildings Meet the Ground is as Important as How They Meet the Sky
James Goettsch, Goettsch Partners
If you are concerned about the urban habitat, you have to be concerned about whether or not buildings provide a positive experience at the ground...
19 September 2012
Tall Buildings in Future Development of Metropolitan Universities
Christopher Groesbeck, VOA Associates; Jon DeVries & John McDonald, Roosevelt University; Ron Klemencic, MKA
In the future, the University will need to consider vertical models to co-exist within their urban cores and create a living and working balance. With...
19 September 2012
3 Environments, 3 Programs, 3 Solutions
Paul De Santis & Travis Soberg, Goettsch Partners
The effects of climate change, increased population, and lack of natural resources are global issues. As the world continues to consolidate into regional urban centers,...
27 January 2012
Debating Tall: A Supertall Future in the US?
Adrian Smith, Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill Architecture; Paul Beitler, Beitler Real Estate Services LLC
In 1990, only 11 buildings in the world could be counted as a “supertall” (defined as a building over 300 meters tall), and all but...
18 January 2012
A Future for Tall Building History
Raymond Hartshorne & Paul Alessandro, Hartshorne Plunkard Architecture
Looking at Chicago's or New York's skylines, one feature that sets apart the first skyscraper cities from the recent ones is the rich history of...
01 November 2011
Humanizing High-rise Urbanism: Design Strategies and Planning Tools
Vinayak Bharne, Moule & Polyzoides
From a global standpoint, the high-rise city remains a negotiated territory, a juggling act between private interests, political processes and public good. But while private...
10 October 2011
What Came First?... the Tall Building or the Urban Habitat
Robert M. Lau, CTBUH; Jon DeVries & John F. McDonald, Roosevelt University
This paper will examine the question, 'Did the Tall Building produce urban density or did the Urban Habitat of CBDs, with the creation of urban...
01 May 2011
The High Life: Residential Towers in Central Business Districts
Peter Noone, Gary Klompmaker & Crista Sumanik, Solomon Cordwell Buenz (SCB)
These buildings serve growing segments of the population who desire amenity-rich lifestyles and safe urban homes. They serve cities that desire significant real estate tax...
01 May 2011
From Eyesore to Urban Asset: The Transformation of Abandoned Railroad Structures in American Cities
Robert Lau, Roosevelt University
The high-line is a new 1.5-mile long public park built on an abandoned elevated railroad stretching from the Meatpacking District to the Hudson Rail Yards...
01 February 2011
Gerard Peet, Rotterdam University of Applied Sciences, The Netherlands
The modern skyscraper is generally considered to be an American invention. Chicago and New York claim they once hosted the world's first skyscraper and many...
31 December 2010
Tallest Buildings Completed in 2010
CTBUH Research
In a year dominated by news coverage of the new “World’s Tallest Building” – Burj Khalifa, Dubai – one may be surprised to learn that,...
01 August 2010
The High-rise as a Retirement Community
Bridget Lesniak & Robert Neper, Perkins + Will; Donald Hamlin, Thornton Tomasetti
As cities are becoming denser, the functions of high-rises are expanding. In addition, the central business district is no longer the exclusive region of the...
01 February 2010
Historical Evolution of the Service Core
Dario Trabucco, IUAV University of Venice, Italy
The service core is the distinctive feature of a tall building: it provides the skyscraper with structural solidity, room for elevators, and other amenities, and...
01 January 2010
Sustainability and the Tall Building: Recent Developments and Future Trends
Mir M. Ali & Paul Armstrong, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
As a major energy consumer, the tall building does not ordinarily conjure images of sustainable design. But a new generation of tall buildings is incorporating...
31 December 2009
Tallest Buildings Completed in 2009
CTBUH Research
Trump International Hotel & Tower named tallest building completed in 2009; Successful year for the American high-rise. Over half of all buildings 200m or taller...
01 August 2009
Case Study: Trump International Hotel & Tower
William Baker & Richard F. Tomlinson, SOM; Paul James, Bovis Lend Lease; Andrew Weiss, The Trump Organization
Chicago, a city known worldwide for its tall buildings, welcomed a new supertall tower to its skyline this year. Bookended by the 442-meter (1,450-foot) Sears...
01 February 2009
Tall Buildings in the Global Recession: 2008, 2020 and Beyond
Philip Oldfield & Antony Wood, CTBUH
The year 2008 will long be remembered as the start of an economic crisis that has gripped the entire globe - a year that may...
01 February 2009
Restoring Mies van der Rohe’s 860-880 Lake Shore Drive: When Less is Not Enough
Rico Cedro, Krueck & Sexton Architects
Mies van der Rohe's 860-880 Lake Shore Drive (1948-51) is one of the supreme monuments of modern architecture. With this pair of apartment buildings, Mies...
12 June 2008
The Tallest Buildings in the World: Past, Present & Future
CTBUH Research
Over time, the average height of the 100 tallest buildings in the world has been steadily increasing. However, by 2010, this average height will have...
09 June 2008
Toward a Better Urban Life: Integration of Cities and Tall Buildings
Mir M. Ali & Ajla Aksamija, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
In the context of a rapidly urbanizing world, architects and planners should aim to create cities that are thriving, vibrant, and healthy. Well-planned cities containing...
03 March 2008
The “International” Skyscraper: Observations
Georges Binder, Buildings & Data SA
While using tall buildings data, the following paper aims to show trends and shifts relating to building use and new locations accomodating high-rise buildings.
03 March 2008
Chicago: Building a Green City
Richard M. Daley & Sadhu Johnston, City of Chicago
Chicago has a tradition of innovation in architecture from balloon-frame houses to steel skyscrapers to today’s green buildings. Chicago was one of the first cities...
01 February 2008
The Race for the Sky: Unbuilt Skyscrapers
Mohamad Kashef, East Carolina University
Unbuilt skyscraper designs are noted by many architecture critics as the best in the genre of tall buildings. This paper provides an exposition of various...
01 February 2008
The “International” Skyscraper: Observations
Georges Binder, Buildings & Data SA
While using tall buildings data, the following paper aims to show trends and shifts relating to building use and new locations accommodating high-rise buildings. After...
20 October 2003
High-rise with Cable Net Facade for the 21st Century!
Abbas Aminmansour, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA
This article offers a synopsis of some of the unique features of the building and offers an insight into the collaboration between team members involved...
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