INTRODUCTION

Formerly known as the Taipei Financial Center, Taipei 101 is an office building in Taipei, Taiwan, standing 508 m tall. When it was completed in 2004, it dethroned the Petronas Twin Towers in Kuala Lumpur Malaysia, 452 m as the tallest building in the world.

Designed by C.Y. Lee & Partners, a local architectural firm and structural consultants from Thornton- Tomasetti Engineers, New York City and Evergreen Consulting Engineers; Taipei 101 is an iconic structure, engineered to withstand strong earthquake tremors as well as powerful typhoons that wreak havoc in Taiwan. It is designed to be resilient against gale winds of 134 mph and the strongest earthquake with an estimated return period of 2,500 years. This performance is mainly attributed to the 660 tonne steel pendulum that serves as a tuned mass damper.

Construction of Taipei 101 began in 1999. The structure was topped out in 2003, and work was completed in 2004. The largest section of the building, between the base and the spire, consists of eight blocks or groupings of eight stories. The building also has a distinctively Chinese character in its resemblance to a stalk of bamboo or an elongated pagoda

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