Construction is currently underway on the Jeddah Tower (previously the Kingdom Tower) in Saudi Arabia, one of the most ambitious construction projects in human history.
The massive skyscraper project is being developed by Jeddah Economic Company (JEC), a joint venture between Kingdom Holding Company, of which it holds a substantial interest, Abrar Holding Company, Qila’a Jeddah Company and Saudi Binladin Group.
The building was designed by architect Adrian Smith, who also designed the current tallest building in the world, the Burj Khalifa, as well as the Trump Tower in Chicago. Construction on the Jeddah Tower began in 2009, before it was paused in 2018 due to the purges in Saudi Arabia, which impacted contractors working on the site, said the report.
Now new satellite imagery provided to Newsweek shows that work is progressing well with parts of the tower being assembled at the construction site, including the tripod-style base, centred about 20km away from the Jeddah city port. Standing tall at about 3,300ft high, the Jeddah Tower will become the tallest building in the world, beating out the Burj Khalifa in Dubai, which stands at 2,722ft.
Seven of the tower’s 170 storeys will be allocated for the five-star Four Seasons hotel offering 200 rooms, 11 storeys for 121 luxury serviced apartments and seven storeys for offices. It will also have 61 storeys that include 318 housing units of various types, along with amenities that include gyms, spas, cafes and restaurants, two sky lobbies and the world’s highest observation decks, located at a height of 644m, enabling visitors to view the city of Jeddah and the Red Sea from high in the sky.
