by Brianna Crandall — May 30, 2014—The renowned Emporis Skyscraper Award goes to London this year. The tallest building in Western Europe, The Shard, was chosen by an international panel of experts out of a pool of more than 300 skyscrapers of at least 100 meters’ height that were completed during the previous calendar year. The award, given by Emporis, the international provider of building data, is now into its fourteenth year.
The 306-meter-tall winning building, designed by the architect Renzo Piano, won over the jury thanks to its unique glass fragment-shaped form and its sophisticated architectural implementation. “Construction of The Shard was complicated by the particularly tight site and therefore needed innovative planning. This makes the result all the more impressive: a skyscraper that is recognized immediately and which is already considered London’s new emblem,” stated the expert jury in explaining its decision.
Second place in the voting went to DC Tower 1 by Dominique Perrault Architecture. The 250-meter-tall Viennese skyscraper particularly stands out for the contrasting way in which its façade is treated: three mirror-smooth sides are broken by a craggy, jagged fourth that gives the building a strength of expression and sense of solidity, despite its slim stature, according to the jury. The skyscraper also impressed due to its comprehensive sustainability concept, including photovoltaics to generate energy, local plants with low water requirements in the green areas of the building, and electric car chargers to save on CO² emissions.
The third-placed project also breaks with the standards of conventional high-rise architecture and thus adds to the great variety of forms and shapes characterizing this year’s Emporis Skyscraper Award. Located on Lake Tai, the Sheraton Huzhou Hot Spring Resort, conceived by last year’s winning architects MAD, is a 102-meter-tall hotel whose shape evokes a gigantic ring. Its daring design is further accentuated by its illumination at night, which creates imposing reflections of the building in the lake, noted the jury.
Although the award went in the last two years to Absolute World Towers in Canada and New York by Gehry at Eight Spruce Street in the USA, no North American skyscraper placed in the Top Ten this year. By contrast, this year’s Emporis Skyscraper Award winners’ list contains a total of five European projects. The last time so many were represented was six years ago. With The Shard, this is the fifth time the coveted architecture prize has gone to Europe, notes Emporis.
The 2013 winners and their architects are listed below:
- The Shard, London, U.K.; Renzo Piano Building Workshop, Adamson Associates International
- DC Tower 1, Vienna, Austria; Dominique Perrault Architecture, Hoffmann-Janz Architekten
- Sheraton Huzhou Hot Spring Resort, Huzhou, China; MAD, Shanghai Xian Dai Architecture Design
- Cayan Tower, Dubai, UAE; Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, Khatib & Alami Dubaiv
- One Central Park (East Tower) , Sydney, Australia; Ateliers Jean Nouvel, PTW Architects
- Flame Towers, Baku, Azerbaijan; HOK
- Mercury City, Moscow, Russia; Frank Williams & Partners, G.L. Sirota, M.M. Posokhin
- Ardmore Residence, Singapore; UNStudio, Architects 61
- AZ Tower, Brno, Czech Republic; Architektonická kancelář Burian-Křivinka
- Nanfung Commercial, Hospitality and Exhibition Complex, Guangzhou, China; Andrew Bromberg of Aedas
- Tour Carpe Diem, Courbevoie, France; Robert A.M. Stern Architects, SRA Architectes
