The Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat has announced that the Ping An Finance Centre, the fourth tallest building in the world, is complete.
The 599m-tall tower is the highest building in Shenzhen, the second tallest in China, and the fourth tallest in the world, behind the Burj Khalifa, the Shanghai Tower and the Makkah Royal Clock Tower in Saudi Arabia.
Designed by New York architect Kohn Pedersen Fox and developed by a Ping An subsidiary formed for the purpose, the building is located in Shenzhen’s southern Futian District.
A large public atrium will sit at the base of the structure with space for shops, restaurants, and transit connections to the city, the Pearl River Delta region and greater China.
The tower will contain space for owners Ping An Life Insurance Company of China and other tenants.
The building is designed to look like a taught steel cable "outstretched by the sky and the ground at once".
At the top of the tower, the façade tapers to form a pyramid, with the shape emphasised by eight composite mega-columns that extrude beyond the building envelope.
The tower is adorned by the largest stainless steel fa̤ade in the world Р1,700 tons of the material were used in its fabrication.
Steel was chosen specifically for this project "due to its corrosion-resistance, which will keep the appearance of the Ping An Finance Center unchanged for several decades despite Shenzhen’s salty coastal atmosphere". Â
Images courtesy of the Ping An Finance Center
