Foundations of the vertical city in England: architectural theory and practice

High-rises are omnipresent typologies in the megapolices around the world, however they are often associated with complicated placemaking and destruction of the existing neighbourhoods. One viable opportunity to change these negative trends is the Vertical City concept, uniting architecture and the urban design disciplines. The reason to research the British high-rises is the fact that there are some examples that are close as design to the concept of Vertical city with their technology, amenities and mix of uses. The goal of this article is to research how the four studied buildings approach the concept of Vertical city. It addresses this goal through three research questions: what design of the buildings represent the concept of Vertical City; how the formal objectives are met to approach the concept of Vertical City; how the socio/economic objectives are met to approach the concept of Vertical City? The methodology achieves the objectives of the study by gathering information for the researched buildings and analysing them according to a template developed on the basis of Vertical City manifesto. The features found in the examined buildings are maximized density and compactness for optimum efficiency which is intrinsic for the high-rises; interconnected amenities for convenience, increased efficiency, and security; mixed uses to provide for vital needs such as housing, employment, recreation, health care; optimizing the efficiency gains of centralized labour and consumption markets by shorter wasteful trips from home to work; maximized range of services and amenities to provide a vivid mix of commercial, recreational and cultural opportunities, and using the latest high-performance technologies to optimize efficiency and sustainability. However, there are many more requirements to be met and the implications of this article are that the designers in Britain will soon address them