Taipei 101 Observatory

Environmental Design

Taipei 101 was classified as the tallest building in the world in 2004 until the 2010 completion of Burj Khalifa. It is the icon of Taiwan and its observatory is one of the highest visited attractions in Taiwan. To celebrate the building’s 10th anniversary, the Observatory held a design competition to help re-imagine the space and the experience.

Our winning design brings fluidity to the square footprint of the building.  Inspired by the ancient Chinese coin, the circle becomes the main pathway while the inner square is the existing building core.  The moment the visitors step out of the elevator, they begin their circular journey.  And we placed all the shops in the inner circle to eliminate any obstructions to the view of the beautiful city below.

As visitors journey through the circular path, new experiences are to be discovered; from an infinity mirror that creates an optical illusion of bottomless floor to a path that leads to the building’s 660 metric tons mass damper.