Vertical Velocity: Taiwan Home to World's Fastest Elevators

The elevators currently the fastest in the world were manufactured by the Japanese corporation Toshiba. Passengers are catapulted at a speed of 1,010 meters per minute, or 60 km/h, from the fifth to the 89th floor of Taipei 101. The ride in this Ferrari among elevators lasts a mere 37 seconds, at the end of which passengers step out already 382 meters above the ground at the observation floor of Taiwan's tallest building.

Elevator speeds researched by Emporis, the international building-data provider (www.emporis.com), emphasize the pole position of the elevators in Taipei 101: the world's second-fastest, located in the Yokohama Landmark Tower, "only" manages a speed of 750 meters per minute.

The world's tallest building, Burj Khalifa, only occupies third place in the list, with a maximum elevator speed of 36 km/h. The skyscraper of superlatives does however offer the world's fastest double-decker elevators. What is more, the double-deckers' passengers are also able to travel the longest distance currently possible in an elevator, exiting after a ride of 504 meters at the world's highest stop, 638 meters up the building.

Overall, the race for the world's fastest elevator is clearly being run in Asian cities. The elevators in Chicago's John Hancock Center are the only ones not in Asia. What is more, 2014 will see a further attraction added to the continent: the elevators that Mitsubishi is set to install in the Shanghai Tower will take over as the world's fastest at a speed of 64.8 km/h. The tower itself will become the world's second-tallest building on completion.

From 2014 onward, with the Shanghai Tower, Shanghai World Financial Center and Jin Mao Tower, there will be no fewer than three skyscrapers containing some of the world's fastest elevators located right next door to one another. For skyscraper fans looking for spectacular elevator rides, Shanghai will be impossible to ignore.

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About Emporis

Emporis is a leading database of information about building and construction projects, based in Germany. For over a decade Emporis has helped companies, organizations and individuals stay informed about the building industry. The Emporis Skyscraper Award is the world’s most renowned prize for high-rise architecture.

The Heights of Hospitality: The World's Highest Hotels

The JW Marriott Marquis Dubai, opened last week, may hold the new record for the world's tallest hotel building, but the true leader in sky-high accommodations remains the Ritz-Carlton in Hong Kong. All the rooms in the world's highest hotel are to be found on floors with three-digit numbers, and offer a magnificent view of Victoria Harbour and the city's skyline from well over 400 meters up. The very highest luxury, in a twofold sense, is enjoyed by guests staying in the 415 m² Ritz-Carlton Suite on the 117th floor.

Research by Emporis (www.emporis.com), the international provider of building data, shows that in fact several hotels around the world exceed the 400 meter mark: the Park Hyatt Shanghai is located on floors 79 to 93 of the Shanghai World Financial Center, the city's tallest building at a height of 492 meters and a total 101 stories; in Shenzhen, the top 26 floors of the 442 meter tall KK100 are home to a St. Regis-Hotel.

At 355 meters in height, the JW Marriott Marquis Dubai, superseded the 22 meters shorter Rose Tower, home to the luxurious Rose Rayhaan by Rotana, as the tallest building solely used as a hotel. Both skyscrapers are located in Dubai and provide their guests with an impressive view of the world's tallest building, Burj Khalifa.

The highest hotels are, however, not just to be found on the uppermost floors of skyscrapers. The Makkah Clock Royal Towermight be the world's second-tallest building, but its Fairmont Hotel only occupies the lower two-thirds of the tower. The top third consists of an enormous clock tower whose face can be seen from as far as 17 km away.

A boom in skyscraper hotel construction is particularly evident in Asian cities - and the future will not see a reduction in the number of sky-high hotels opening there: three of the buildings in the list were only completed in 2012, and further hotels of superlative dimension are already in the starting blocks, among them the controversial Ryugyong Hotel in Pyongyang. The 330 meter tall building, which has been under construction since 1986, will not now have the 3,000 rooms originally planned, but, in housing a Kempinski Hotel, will introduce the first western hotel chain to North Korea.

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About Emporis

Emporis is a leading database of information about building and construction projects, based in Germany. For over a decade Emporis has helped companies, organizations and individuals stay informed about the building industry. The Emporis Skyscraper Award is the world’s most renowned prize for high-rise architecture.

Top Views: The World's Highest Observation Decks

"At the Top" is the name of the observation deck at Burj Khalifa, the world's tallest building. Although the name might suggest otherwise, and despite being 452 meters up, "At the Top" does not actually lead its field - and not by some distance. In fact, the 828-meter tall skyscraper in Dubai only makes third place in a list of the world's highest observation decks just compiled by Emporis (www.emporis.com), the international provider of building data.

Topping the ranking is Canton Tower, at 618 meters the world's third-tallest structure, which is home, at 488 meters, to the world's highest publicly-accessible observation deck. The tower not only provides a magnificent view of Guangzhou, but also offers a further attraction to visitors with a particularly good head for heights - the chance to circle the top of tower in glass pods 460 meters above the ground.

The Shanghai World Financial Center ranks at similarly dizzying heights. Its Skywalk 100, a 55-meter long glass bridge 474 meters up the tower, puts it in second place in the ranking. It will have to give up its current spot, though, when its neighbor Shanghai Tower is completed next year. At the spectacular height of 557 meters, Shanghai Tower's observation deck will then far outstrip even the current record-holder.

Also not for the faint-hearted is Willis Tower, the tallest skyscraper in the United States. Originally opened as far back as 1974, more recently installed glass balconies with transparent floors on the west side of the building invite visitors to take an unobstructed look down. Here one can experience the unique feeling of hovering 413 meters above the city.

The battle for the world's highest observation deck is set to remain exciting into the future. Last month saw the start of construction work on Kingdom Tower in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. The megaproject, due to have an overall height of over a kilometer, will put even Burj Khalifa in the shade. With an observation deck planned at a height of around 800 meters, it will bring the desert state not only the title of the world's tallest building, but also that of the world's highest observation deck. It will be a few years yet, however, before one can enjoy the view from the king of towers, with opening planned for 2018.

Download photos of the highest observation decks

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About Emporis

Emporis is a leading database of information about building and construction projects, based in Germany. For over a decade Emporis has helped companies, organizations and individuals stay informed about the building industry. The Emporis Skyscraper Award is the world's most renowned prize for high-rise architecture.

Art and Architecture: The World's Most Spectacular Museums

Hamburg, May 28, 2013 - That time-honored institution, the museum, is gradually being superseded. Increasingly, instead of old-fashioned exhibition rooms, it is gigantic event and experience locations that await the visitor. More often than not designed by star architects, many museums now count among the most impressive buildings of our time. As total works of art, it is not just the treasures within that fascinate, but also the breathtaking symbiosis of exhibits and architecture.

A selection of the world's most spectacular museums has now been compiled by a jury of building experts from Emporis (www.emporis.com), the international provider of building data. The list contains some of the most diverse museum buildings from all over the world - from the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York, opened in 1959, to the Museum of Islamic Art in Doha, Qatar.

The most prominent example is star architect Frank O. Gehry's Guggenheim Bilbao, a building that stands like no other for this new understanding of museum architecture. The shiny silver monumental sculpture was the principal reason for Bilbao's transformation from a small industrial city into a major international center of art, a transformation that has come to be known as the "Bilbao Effect". The building continues to this day to influence the architecture of many a 21st-century museum.

Museum design allows architects to play with a very wide range of architectural forms and styles. This can be seen for example in Daniel Libeskind's deconstructivist works such as the Jewish Museum in Berlin or the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto. His asymmetrical structures of iridescent steel and glass, with sloping floors and walls without right-angles, attract the attention. That an empty architectural shell can draw crowds all by itself was demonstrated by the 350,000 visitors who came to marvel at the Jewish Museum even before it opened.

Extravagant structures have their price, however, and it is not uncommon for costs to reach into the hundreds of millions. Nevertheless, the wave of unique museum buildings is not about to ebb. In Lyon, for instance, work is proceeding on the planned completion in 2014 of the Musée des Confluences, a massive civic project designed by Coop Himmelb(l)au. The 190-meter-long structure, a combination of a giant crystal and a cloud, floats eight meters above the ground and will house a museum of science and society.

Download Photos of the Most Spectacular Museums of the World

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About Emporis

Emporis is a leading database of information about building and construction projects, based in Germany. For over a decade Emporis has helped companies, organizations and individuals stay informed about the building industry. The Emporis Skyscraper Award is the world's most renowned prize for high-rise architecture.