Eric Demay: China 19: Pudong, Shanghai

Not the “right view” (which has been planed from the Bund, a little bit up the river to the left) but a better perspective to the scale of the buildings, towering the waterfront.

Pudong, the East side of the Huangpu river that crosses Shanghai, has skyrocketed from farmland to skyscrapers in less than 20 years. The city district holds a sub-provincial administrative status, which has been defined as to become mainland’s China most important financial and commercial hub. Settled to attract foreign investments, construction and planning started in the early 90s and Pudong today hosts a world class skyline which, by the way, is still growing.

The SWFC gets all Daft-Punk style at nighttime.

The latest addition to the financial Lujiazui district is the Shanghai World Financial Center with its roof hitting 492m, the tallest building of China (including Hong Kong), and the second-tallest in the world. And the original planning asks for another über-tower. So, the Shanghai tower was annouced to crown the district, hitting 632m (thus surpassing the taiwanese by far) with completion originally planned in time for the 2010 expo, but delays delay, construction started only very recently, unfortunately it won’t be done till 2014.

In the big blue empty space on the right, imagine the 128 story tall, slick glass facade skyscraper, twisting on itself as it rises, its skin curled towards the sky. Something like this.