A project from Frankfurt did not make it into the last five.

Although the ONE high-rise in the Europaviertel and the Senckenberg quarter on the old university campus in Bockenheim were nominated for the International High-Rise Award, in the end the decision was made between towers from Vancouver, Vienna, New York, Singapore and Sydney.

Gunter Murr

Editor in the Rhein-Main-Zeitung.

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It almost sounded a little apologetic when Frankfurt City Councilor Ina Hauck, representing Ina Hartwig (both SPD), who was ill, pointed out at the presentation of the award winner that only about one high-rise building is completed in Frankfurt per year, but thousands in Asia.

Carbon dioxide and construction costs saved

The 200 meter high Quay Quarter Tower in the Australian metropolis of Sydney won the race.

The jury was particularly impressed that the previous building, a high-rise from the 1970s, was not demolished but integrated into the new building.

"This is the world's largest transformation of an existing building," said Kim Herforth Nielsen, founder of Copenhagen-based architecture firm 3XN, which designed the tower.

"We cannot demolish and rebuild like we have done in the past."

This brings ecological and economic gains: Since two-thirds of the old building was retained in the Quay Quarter Tower, 12,000 tons of carbon dioxide, construction costs of the equivalent of 130 million euros and a year of construction time were saved, as Nielsen said.

Nevertheless, the usable area has been doubled and the tower looks as if it were completely new.

Head of Planning Mike Josef (SPD), who presented the award in the Paulskirche on Tuesday evening, spoke of the "world's most innovative skyscraper".

Trend towards sustainability

Matthias Danne, Deputy CEO of Deka-Bank, which has been awarding the prize since 2004 together with the City of Frankfurt and the German Architecture Museum, is also convinced.

"It's never sustainable to demolish an old building and replace it with a new one," he said.

In his opinion, the current construction prices will change construction more in the direction of sustainability than all regulatory requirements.

In general, the topics of environment and climate played a major role in the nominated projects, said Peter Cachola Schmal, Director of the German Architecture Museum.

The construction of high-rise buildings is necessary simply to accommodate the growing world population in densely populated cities.

A high-rise apartment building in Vancouver that made it into the finals shows how this works: it stands on a piece of land next to a freeway that is almost unbuildable, which is why it has a triangular floor plan at the bottom and widens into a rectangle at the top.

All nominated projects are on display at the Museum Angewandte Kunst from November 10th to January 22nd.