Burj Dubai Tower was commissioned by Emaar Properties, as part of its U.S. $8 billion Downtown Dubai development project. Built of glass, aluminium, concrete and steel, Burj Tower will be the tallest building in the world with a total floor space of 500,000 square meters (5.35 million square feet). Taipei 101 in Taiwan (509 meters), Petronas Towers in Malaysia (452 meters) and the Chicago's Sears Tower (442 meters) are currently the world's highest manmade towers. Recently China and the New York World Trade Center redevelopment have announced plans to exceed these records, but the Burj Tower developers have anticipated challengers and will dig extra-deep foundations to enable more storys to be added later if needed.
Chicago-based Skidmore, Owings & Merrill architectural consultants have drawn their plans from the historical influences of the Gulf. The tower's base and geometry reflects the six-petal desert flower of the region as well as indigenous Islamic patterns. The base of the Burj Dubai blossoms to allow the tower a graceful transition from the ground and to maximize views, while the dome-shaped plan profile accentuates a series of steps up the vertical height of the building. The top of the tower will contain a public observation deck and a private club will be situated above that.
The Burj Dubai Tower will be constructed by South Korea's Samsung Corporation and should be completed by November 2008.
In the shadow of the Burj Tower will be the Dubai Mall — the largest shopping space in the world with more than 9 million feet of retail, residential and entertainment facilities. The mall also will host more than 1,000 specialty shops located within the 10-15 distinct 'malls-within-a-mall.’ It will offer an a three-story aquarium featuring glass tunnels. It also will feature an 850,000-square-foot fashion island. When finished in 2006, Dubai Mall is expected to attract over 35 million visitors in the first year of operations.
For more information: http://www.emaar.com/new/projects_burjdubai.html
