For a new high-rise office building located within the Tashkent City Masterplan, Uzbekistan’s current largest urban development, our design envisioned the construction of a key component in the newly established business district.

With the government looking to drive the city’s development and introduce high-rise buildings into a predominantly low-rise cityscape, we sought to define a building concept that would support both ambitions. A rational and flexible grid principle as the starting point of the building concept is united with a research-oriented parametric design approach. The basis of the design is a typical open-plan office layout with a concrete core and column structure. The building shape features a literal twist, creating a transition between the building base and the surrounding environment and moving up towards a panoramic observation deck.

Following a similar pattern, the façade uses a typical rectangular shape as the basis and introduces an element of transparency, creating an intriguing and ever-changing appearance from top to bottom, symbolising the building’s core function as a semi-opaque bank headquarters. Transparent and inviting public facilities populate the ground-floor and rooftop levels.

Like the transformation that Tashkent is currently undergoing, the final building design could be considered representative of the journey rather than the destination.