Here is another reason to buy a mega-million-dollar apartment in a Manhattan high-rise: Earthquake forecast maps for New York City that a federal agency issued on Thursday indicate “a slightly lower hazard for tall buildings than previously thought.”

The agency, the United States Geological Survey, tempered its latest quake prediction with a big caveat.

“The tall buildings in Manhattan are not where you should be focusing [...]" — nytimes.com

225 West 57th Street‘s facade will top-out 1,479′ above street level, while a surprise spire on top will cap the tower at 1,775 feet. Adrian Smith and Gordon Gill are designing the building.

The new height details will result in several superlatives: Manhattan will finally retake the ‘tallest roof’ in the United States from Chicago’s Willis Tower, which stands 1,451′, and 225 West 57th Street will become the tallest residential building in the entire world [...]. — newyorkyimby.com

Imagined with bright pink and green lights, standing more than 150m taller than the Burj Khalifa and emerging from an island in a lake in central China, these plans for Wuhan’s Phoenix Towers seem a world away from grey old London.

Yet the ambitious design revealed this week has been put forward by the British architectural firm Chetwoods, and owes much of its inspiration to an award-winning project for a new, greener London Bridge. — independent.co.uk

In land-scarce Singapore greenery too is going sky-ward, with a 24-storey condominium earning a Guinness record for boasting the world’s largest vertical garden.

Tree House condominium, completed in 2013 by property firm City Developments Limited, has covered its façade in nearly 2,300 square meters of greenery. [...]

The condo uses the plants as natural insulation to help filter pollution, absorb heat and reduce the amount of energy needed to cool individual units. — blogs.wsj.com

The plan’s backers say it represents a rare chance at economic revitalization for the neighborhood. Its opponents say it would destroy the fabric of Holy Cross, and might represent the first step toward changing the traditionally low-rise New Orleans waterfront into something very different [...]

“The argument is that the Lower Ninth Ward has to take what it can get,” says DeBacher. “We believe that we deserve—as any community deserves—good development, not just any development.” — The Atlantic Cities

The winners for the 9th annual eVolo Skyscraper Competition have finally been revealed! The sky is indeed the limit for the popular worldwide competition, which gave participants complete freedom with their skyscraper designs. Imaginative ideas aside, entrants also had to examine the skyscraper's definition, purpose, and potential in the 21st century. — bustler.net

Up until recently Canary Wharf was the only place for skyscrapers in London. [...]

Now it seems that London is going to receive a more cohesive skyline, with a new study produced by the New London Architecture (NLA) thinktank suggesting that at least 236 tall buildings (those over 20 storeys in height) are currently proposed, approved or under construction in the capital. — independent.co.uk

Six years after Comcast Corp. moved into the tallest U.S. skyscraper between Manhattan and Chicago, the cable-TV and Internet giant expects to break ground this summer on an even taller, more dazzling $1.2-billion tower. [...]

One of the world's leading architects, Britain's Norman Robert Foster, has designed the trophy building with a host of innovative features. — philly.com

UNStudio was recently chosen to design the Baumkirchen Mitte, an office and residential complex in Munich, Germany. In collaboration with OR else Landscapes, UNStudio won out of six shortlisted finalist teams that included BIG, J Mayer H Architects, and Schneider + Schumacher Architects. — bustler.net

OMA announced today the completion of De Rotterdam Tower at the Wilhelmina Pier in Rotterdam. Widely described as a "Vertical City", stacked on top of the structure's six-story base are three transparent towers - built with 7 meters of space between them. — bustler.net

UNStudio recently announced the completion of the Ardmore Residence tower in Singapore City. The building's monochromatic facade is distinctive yet it easily complements neighboring structures and location near the Orchard Road luxury shopping district. And at 36 stories high, residents are guaranteed envy-inducing panoramic views of the city. — bustler.net

Wiel Arets Architects recently completed the E' Tower in Eindhoven in the Netherlands. The design of the 22-floor, 110-apartment building is derived from the Brick Expressionist style that was common during the city's industrial period and throughout Northern Europe in the early 20th century. — bustler.net

The skyline of Taiyuan, the capital and largest city of North China's Shanxi province, is scheduled to receive a 280-meter / 919-foot addition soon: German firm HENN has won the architectural competition to design the new Cenke Group tower sporting a slick convex shell. Planning is expected to commence in 2014/15. — bustler.net

Wiel Arets Architects announced today the completion of the Anna van Buerenplein (AvB) Tower located in The Hague in The Netherlands. Standing at 72 m (approx. 236 ft), the steel AvB Tower was built as a "hyper-hybrid" academic building that includes housing, dining, and retail for students and faculty. — bustler.net

We noticed in Journal 2013 Issue I’s case study on Kingdom Tower, Jeddah, that a fair amount of the top of the building seemed to be an unoccupied spire. This prompted us to investigate the increasing trend towards extreme spires and other extensions of tall buildings that do not enclose usable space, and create a new term to describe this – Vanity Height, i.e., the distance between a skyscraper’s highest occupiable floor and its architectural top, as determined by CTBUH Height Criteria. — CTBUH