The Urban Towers Handbook

One of the very few comprehensive surveys and categorizations of tower construction in cities. This book avoid the usual traps of form, shape or image in favour of a more methodical way of considering the role of towers in the contemporary city, and the effect of their repetition as 'types' rather than the individual landmark. The comparison of tower management planning systems is particularly excellent.

As someone who has been through a textbook-intensive degree course, albeit in geography rather than architecture, I know this book is ideal for students but is it interesting to the layperson? I think so, but others may find that in some areas it doesn't contain enough general detail to satisfy their questions.I'd urge anyone who is not an architecture or urban planning student to skip the introduction, as it's irrelevant and possibly confusing to anyone who just wants to read the subject as new. But the amount of background information on some of the world's most iconic buildings, along with footprint plans, sections and photographs, makes this a fascinating read. I've learned things I never knew before - about landmark viewing corridors, sky exposure planes and the transfer of unused development rights - and have gained insights into a subject that, had I been younger, might sway me towards studying that subject myself.There are some buildings that it could be said don't receive enough attention, for example the Burj Khalifa which gets just one page, and a brief mention later. But this needs to be seen in context - this is a textbook, and it concentrates on classifications - where each typology has one main example and two additional examples. If the authors see more merit in concentrating on the Kingdom Centre as a monument type to help explain their point then it's hard to argue fairly against that.Please note that the price is fairly typical of a reading list textbook and anyone who buys the book believing that a high cover price should mean every subject is covered in every detail they themselves are interested in is making the wrong assumption as to what the book is for. This is not designed to be an overview guide to the buildings featured - the buildings are there as examples to help explain the different typologies of high rise buildings. Some of the language used will be difficult to understand if you haven't done the background reading that students will have done before getting this, and I struggled with some of it but wouldn't expect every term in the book to be explained for my benefit. I have a feeling that the review score from those of us getting the book for free will average out lower than that from those who pay for it.

This is a well-laid-out overview of a variety of "urban towers" from round the world, including a few (such as the Shard at London Bridge) that don't yet exist in their finished form.The main part of the book is a "visual dictionary" of various types of tower ("Solitaries - Monument", "Clusters - Tower on Podium" and so on). The categories are rather arbitrary, but the selection is excellent, including not only the usual suspects (Kingdom Tower, 30 St Mary Axe) but also some smaller towers such as the Tour ar Men (only 36m high) and the Pinnacle@Duxton, which is an astonishing development of seven interlinked towers of what is in effect council houses in Singapore.The book tends to concentrate more on the bases of the towers, which is the interface between the building and its surroundings. There are generally three examples of each category of tower (so for example the "Monument in Block" category has 30 St Mary Axe, which gets six pages including several photographs and diagrams, and the Torre Agbar and the Seagram Building with one page each).After the "visual dictionary", there are a couple of other sections, one giving an outline of building regulations and the logic behind them for seven cities including London, New York and Hong Kong, and the other aiming to show how high-rise can be sustainable, cost-effective and socially beneficial (most people would probably agree that downtown New York is a lot more appealing than the low-rise sprawl of Los Angeles).The colour photographs and diagrams in this book are not large, but the layout is excellent, and it's a great taster for the world of high rise buildings.

Firstly, I am no an architect or in any sort of related business, but am interested in buildings and architecture, in particular tall ones.The book contains fifty case studies of tall buildings around the world, many of them iconic, in which the authors briefly describe the history of the developments, their relationship to their urban surroundings and then notes about the architecture itself. There are plenty of excellent pictures and diagrams. The book splits up the towers into three sections, based on how they are located. I particularly like this approach. For example, a "solitaire" building is a single tall building that has to be incorporated into an existing urban series of blocks, perhaps low rise, whilst in a city such as Tokyo, a tall buildings will slot into a city that's already mainly composed of high rises. I guess if you're an architect, then the setting is important and will influence the visual appearance, and also the ground level where it has to interact with public spaces and existing infrastructure.The case studies also touch on how the economics affect the final design (i.e. floor height means more can be fit into the building!)The book is not particularly heavy on architectural terms and theory, which makes it good for a layman like myself.The final section is a comparison of planning regulations in seven cities - this may be interesting to people in the profession, when when you get down to it, I was mainly interested in the pictures and histories of the various buildings covered.So speaking as a non-architect, I'd recommend this to anyone with an interest in tall buildings who isn't an architect. The writing is clear and concise and the photographs are beautiful.

I found this book wasn't quite what I was expecting, I thught it was probably designed for someone in the trade - which is not me - but I am fascinated with skylines like New York and London and thought the photography and studies in this book would be wonderful for me.When I saw the list price of this book I was shocked and thought it would be a massive book, it is big but in no way unusual big, I do not in any way think a list price of fifty pounds is justified and to spend the thirty five it is currently on sale for would be way overpriced to me.I thought the language used in the book was overtly complicated, no need at all for that, so made the reading side not half as good as could be and I agree with the previous reviewer that not enough time was given to some projects like the shard. I did find it very interesting and some of the buildings covered did really interest me but also the book featured very plain not attractive high rise too.I felt that even if I worked in this area I would find the book not instructive enought for the price, and as a person interested in skyline and buildings that not enough fun and infomation was given on designs.I gave it 3 stars though because the book is doing what it says on the tin, just not in such a constructive or beautiful way as it could have been, and it loses stars because it would have been better as a boring report on some building for free, or an amazing book covering more of the wonderful building around the world.

I live in London and love travelling to other cities. I have used this almost as a guide book because I love tall buildings, too. Being able to understand a bit more about them, and their footprints, and the thoughts of what designers have to think about, as this book explains, has certainly given me greater clarity and a deeper understanding of these marvellous structures.Quite a few cities themselves are profiled, as well as some of the more unusual buildings around the world.... Not necessarily tall buildings, but large buildings, too.It is handsomely printed and cleanly presented. An ideal gift for most people, I reckon, who is interested in architecture, city living, city travelling, design (lots of design features are profiled) and such things.