Located in Longgang district, one of Shenzhen’s historical industrial powerhouses, Shenzhen Galaxy Twin Towers will be a center piece of the city’s urban regeneration.

Upon its completion in 2023, the 168-foot-tall (365-meter-tall) symbolic pair of buildings will be certified as the “Tallest Twin Buildings of Equal Height in China” by the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat (CTBUH). The prestigious title honors the highest level of technical excellence and innovation applied in this project and extraordinary contributions made to the advancement of tall buildings and the urban environment.

Since 2011, AECOM’s multi-disciplinary team has been constantly providing integrated services for this project, including architecture design, structural engineering and construction management.

As a part of the Galaxy Yabao Hi-tech Innovation Park, the towers are shaped like bamboo shoots, standing in the urban green valley that reaches to the nearby mountains, reservoir and river. Undoubtedly, the twisting skyscrapers have also brought great challenges to the construction. First, to ensure its elegant shape and lasting gloss, the project team tested hundreds of molds for its panels. Second, the design adopts a steel frame structural system with reinforced layers and reinforced concrete core tubes to ensure the safety and stability of the towers, which is built in complicated geological conditions. 65,000 tons of steel was used in the construction of the buildings — equivalent to nine Eiffel Towers. A series of sustainable building strategies such as BIM technologies and prefabricated construction are incorporated to shorten construction period and reduce environment pollution.

This high-tech mega-city complex is designed for a multifunctional community, which includes living and working spaces, shopping recreation, a 1,200-seat theater, a 602,779-square-foot (56,000-square-meter) commercial center, and multiple office buildings that are seamlessly connected to the Yabao Station of Metro Line 10. Our team completed the conceptual planning, landscape design of key areas, as well as the architectural and engineering design of most of the complex’s individual buildings.

With the inspiring technologies to future-buildings, the landmark represents an exceptional accomplishment that brings ever-lasting positive impact to the local community by accelerating the great change of the area from abandoned sites to an ecological industrial hub where people can lead a well-balanced life, working and living in an innovative environment.

Once the towers are completed, the output value of the entire park is expected to exceed US$10 billion, which will play a pivotal role in boosting the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area’s economic growth.