170. Norman Foster,
Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank,

Hong Kong, 1979-1986 (China)

Rumoured at the time to be the most expensive building per square metre ever constructed, Norman Foster’s 47-storey headquarters for the Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank was built on the site of its predecessor of 1935, which was at one time the tallest and most sophisticated building in Asia. As the machine-like articulation of the building suggests, Foster makes little distinction between architecture and engineering: here his team sourced prefabricated elements from all over the world, and the exactitude of the building’s technical specifications approached that of aircraft construction. Inspired by bridge design, he divided the skyscraper into five horizontal zones: each is suspended from a steel ‘coat hanger’ truss to form a series of vertically stacked communities. The main structural piers are pushed out to the corners to maximise stability in typhoons. There is thus no need for a concrete central core: each floor can be completely open. Foster is also keen to foreground human concerns: daylight is channeled into the 10-storey entrance atrium through a system of computer-controlled mirrors that track the progress of the sun. The positioning of the escalators, and much else, was determined by local Feng Shui masters.