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The Generali Tower at CityLife, Milan is nearing completion

The 170m tower is one of the centrepieces to the CityLife redevelopment, opening the old fair grounds to year-round public use with the inclusion of new civic spaces and residential buildings in addition to shopping areas and offices. When complete, CityLife will be the largest new public space created in Milan for over 120 years.

A new public plaza with shops and restaurants forms the base of the tower, with the floors above accommodating more than 3,000 staff to meet Generali’s expansion.

At the intersection of important routes through the city which converge at its base, the #Generali Tower is aligned at ground level to connect directly with its surrounding public plaza. The realignment of successive floors incrementally twists the tower around its vertical axis. This incremental twisting has been calculated to give each floor a fractionally different relationship to the floors above and below. As the tower rises offering broader views across the city, the twist re-orientates the upper floors to face the Duomo, Milan’s renowned cathedral.

ZHA developed a double-façade system for the Generali Tower with inclined structural columns that increase efficiencies in usable floor areas and contribute to its targeted LEED Gold certification. A system of sun-deflecting louvers flanked by glazing that includes ventilating registers to draw in outside air through the cavity provides an extremely efficient environmental control for each floor.

Photo by Roberto Arsuffi