Three months after mainland China’s tallest building opened to tenants, ground is being broken just next door in Shanghai for a $2.2 billion building more than one-fourth higher.

Next up is a 632-meter, 128-floor building dubbed Shanghai Tower. China’s latest fantastical super-tall shopping, office and hotel skyscraper is designed to curl heavenward, incorporating “green” elements such as rainwater capture and wind redirecting technology. Gardens will grow in between and around what are essentially nine cylindrical buildings stacked atop one another, all of it visible through a transparent façade.

Shanghai Tower is being built by a consortium of companies owned by the municipal government — two years ago the local government had put the project on hold amid a big corruption scandal. San Francisco-based Gensler is the designer, while the design institute of Shanghai’s Tongji University will act as the local partner.

Shanghai Tower is set for a 2014 completion.

Shanghai Tower

The Council on Tall Buildings and the Urban Habitat has named the Shanghai World Financial Center the “Best Tall Building Overall” for 2008. Designed by Kohn Pedersen Fox (KPF) and completed last year, the building was chosen from among four “Regional Tall Building” winners, including The New York Times Building by Renzo Piano Building Workshop with FXFOWLE, London’s 51 Lime Street by Foster and Partners, and the Bahrain World Trade Center by Atkins.

The Shanghai World Financial Center, which boasts the highest occupied floor in the world, was chosen as the winner for “its revolutionary structural design and inspirational symbolism,” according to the council. Formed out of a square prism intersected by two “cosmic arcs,” the building includes a distinctive, multi-story trapezoidal aperture at its upper floors. The firm’s design was inspired by two Chinese burial symbols: “a square prism essentially representative of the earth, and a heaven symbol—a circular disc with a circular aperture cut through it,” says Bill Pedersen, FAIA, of KPF. “We wanted to do a building that was a genuine expression of the relationship between the earth and the sky,” he explains, “and also that could be connected to the culture within which it is placed.”

Shanghai World Financial Center

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Shanghai will open the world’s third-tallest skyscraper to the public tomorrow (August 30th 2008) , 14 years after the project began.

Total investment in the 101-story, 492-meter-high landmark project, located in Pudong’s Lujiazui Finance and Trade Zone, amounts to over eight billion Yuan (1.16 billion U.S. dollars).

This building will be the 2nd highest completed building in the world behind the Taipei 101. The Burj Dubai once completed will push this building to 3rd place.

Seeking to set it apart from your average slate-grey skyscraper, MAD designed the SinoSteel Plaza to be “natural, organic and futuristic.” Situated in Tianjing near BoHai Bay, the complex comprises two structures: a 1,174 foot tower and an adjacent hotel.

Each building’s elegant white façade plays an integral role in its energy efficiency: “By mapping the different air flows and solar direction across the site, we were able to position different sized windows accordingly, minimizing heat loss in the winter and heat gain in the summer.” The façade also acts as the building’s main structural support, which allows the interior spaces great flexibility for the types of use they can accommodate.

Construction is currently underway and the complex will be completed in 2011.

Two days ago, the all-authoritative Xinhua produly proclaimed that the new building, which is to be named Shanghai Center (we are unsure if this has any relation to the existing Shanghai Center) will be the tallest building east of Dubai at 580 meters and 118 stories. According to them, that’s 72 meters higher than the Taipei 101 Tower, currently the tallest building in Asia at 508 meters.

The City of Guangzhou – host city to the 2010 Asian Games is also set to house one of the world’s tallest buildings. The new TV Tower will be one of the tallest buildings in the world – reaching 610m in height and is hoped will attract 10,000 visitors daily. The 610-metre-tall twisted, tapering tube is formed by the rotation between two ellipses which form a ‘waist’ in the centre of the building. All the giant building’s functional workings are hidden at the base and all infrastructural connections are met underground. This level supports other facilities as well, including a museum, dining facilities, commercial space and car parks. Slow-speed panoramic and enclosed high-speed double-decker lifts serve both entrance levels. Between 80-170m will consist of facilities like a 4D cinema, restaurants, coffee shops and outdoor gardens. At 170+ there will be an open-air staircase which spirals almost 200 metres higher. The building is set to be finished late 2009, in time for the games.

Dutch Information Based Architecture (IBA) is the prime contractor on this project.