How tall is The Shard?

How tall is the Shard?

The Shard, the glass pyramid beside London Bridge station, stands 309.6 m (1,016 ft) at its highest point, the height used on this site and the figure published by its developer. That makes it the tallest building in the United Kingdom and in Western Europe. It has 95 stories in all, of which 72 are habitable; the levels above the 72nd floor belong to the open, tapering spire that gives the tower its splintered top.

The Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat (CTBUH), which maintains the world's official skyscraper rankings, lists a slightly lower figure: 306 m (1,004 ft) for both architectural height and tip, with the highest occupied floor at 244.3 m. The difference is about 3.6 m and comes from where the top of the structure is taken to be. During construction, the steel frame of the spire topped out at about 308.7 m, and the final 516 panes of glass fitted above it took the building to 309.6 m. Either way, the Shard ranks first in London and the UK in CTBUH's lists.

A sketch on a menu

The Shard began with a lunch. In 1998, the London property developer Irvine Sellar decided to redevelop Southwark Towers, a 24-story 1970s office block on the site, after a government white paper encouraged tall buildings at major transport hubs. In the spring of 2000 he met the Italian architect Renzo Piano in Berlin. Piano, who told Sellar he disliked conventional tall buildings, turned over the restaurant menu and sketched a spire-like form rising out of the River Thames. That sketch became the Shard.

Piano drew on several images: the railway lines beside the site, the church spires in the eighteenth-century London views painted by Canaletto, and the masts of sailing ships. He wanted the angled glass panes to reflect the sky so that the building's color would change with the weather and the seasons. The facade uses about 11,000 panes of glass. Not everyone was persuaded. English Heritage said the tower would be like "a shard of glass through the heart of historic London," and the description gave the building its name.

The planning battle and the financial crisis

The height drew strong opposition. In July 2002 the Deputy Prime Minister, John Prescott, called a public inquiry after objections from the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment, English Heritage and other heritage bodies. The inquiry sat in the spring of 2003, and on 19 November 2003 the government approved the scheme, saying it would allow skyscrapers only of exceptional design and that this one met the standard.

Money then became the obstacle. Demolition of Southwark Towers began in 2008, just as the global financial crisis threatened the project. In January 2008 a consortium of Qatari investors bought an 80 percent stake, and in 2009 the State of Qatar consolidated its ownership. Today the Shard and the surrounding Shard Quarter are owned 95 percent by Qatar and 5 percent by Sellar Property Group. The contract cost of the tower was about £435 million.

Rising at three meters a day

Full construction began on 16 March 2009. The project used top-down construction, digging the foundations while the concrete core was already rising, the first time this method was used in the UK. By March 2010 the core was climbing about 3 m a day. In November 2010 it passed 235 m, ending One Canada Square's 18-year reign as Britain's tallest building, and by late 2011 the Shard had become the tallest building in the European Union, overtaking Frankfurt's 259 m Commerzbank Tower.

The spire was a separate engineering feat. Steelwork contractors test-assembled it at an airfield in North Yorkshire before taking it apart and transporting it to London. On 30 March 2012 the 66 m, 500-tonne spire was winched into place, the steel structure topped out at about 308.7 m, and the last glass panes brought the tower to 309.6 m. The building was inaugurated on 5 July 2012, shortly before the London Olympics, and reached practical completion in November that year. One small story from the build became famous: a fox, nicknamed Romeo by the workers, was found living near the top of the unfinished tower, surviving on builders' scraps, before being rescued.

The Shard compared with other tall structures

At 309.6 m, the Shard sits just below a cluster of famous 320–330 m landmarks and well above everything else in Britain.

The cluster of near-identical heights is a reminder of how close the Shard came to a number of milestones: it fell 20 m short of the Eiffel Tower and 9 m short of a New York tower built more than 80 years earlier. Two comparisons stand out. The Chrysler Building, completed in 1930, is still about 9 m taller than this 2012 tower, and the concrete transmitter mast at Emley Moor in West Yorkshire remains the UK's tallest free-standing structure, about 20 m higher than the Shard. Within London, the Shard is more than three times the height of Big Ben and more than twice that of the London Eye. You can set these side by side at true scale in the 3D height comparison tool.

Why London stops at about 310 meters

The Shard has held the UK height record since 2012, and there are reasons it has not been beaten. Tall buildings in central London are constrained by protected views of St Paul's Cathedral and other landmarks, by heritage objections like those raised at the Shard's own inquiry, and by aviation safety around the city's airports. The clearest example is the Pinnacle, a tower in the City of London originally planned to rival the Shard. Concerns from the Civil Aviation Authority led to its height being cut, and the scheme was replaced by 22 Bishopsgate at 287.9 m. The Shard's site south of the river, at a major rail hub and outside the tightest view corridors, was one reason its height was approved at all.

The Shard is also taller than every natural hill in London and the surrounding counties. That fact explains the remarkable range of the views from the top: on a clear day the building looks out over the whole Thames basin to the chalk hills beyond.

The Shard by the numbers

• Human scale. At 309.6 m, the Shard is about 177 times the height of a 175 cm (5′9″) adult.
• Spire share. The 66 m spire lifted into place in 2012 makes up about a fifth of the building's total height.
• Height per habitable floor. With the skydeck at about 244 m on the 72nd floor, each habitable story averages about 3.4 m, including the taller office floors at the base.
• Glass. About 11,000 panes cover a surface area of roughly 56,000 m², close to eight football pitches.
• Construction speed. The concrete core rose at about 3 m a day at its fastest, reaching the 72nd floor at about 244 m in early 2011, roughly two years after full construction began.

A vertical city inside

The developer designed the Shard as a "vertical city," stacking different uses on top of one another as the floors shrink with height. The lower levels hold offices, with a naturally ventilated winter garden on each office floor according to the building's official site. Above them come restaurants, the five-star Shangri-La The Shard hotel, whose pool is described as the highest hotel pool in Western Europe, and then a small number of residential apartments. At the top, the public viewing gallery fills the highest habitable floors.

The pyramid shape is practical as well as striking: large floor plates at the bottom suit offices, while the narrower upper floors suit hotel rooms and apartments with views in several directions. The CTBUH lists 44 elevators serving these uses, and describes the structure as a concrete and steel composite. The tower stands directly above London Bridge station, so most people arrive by train or the Underground.

Visiting The View from The Shard

The View from The Shard opened to the public on 1 February 2013. It occupies the upper habitable floors, with an open-air skydeck on the 72nd floor at about 244 m, the highest viewing platform in the UK. The official visitor site advertises 360-degree panoramic views; on clear days, the most distant natural point visible from the top is Walbury Hill, close to the Wiltshire border. Tickets are sold online, children's tickets start from £10, and children under four go free with an adult. The entrance is on Joiner Street, a two-minute walk from London Bridge station, and opening hours vary by day and season, so checking ahead is wise.

From the skydeck you look up into the open spire, whose fractured glass blades continue for more than 60 m above you. For converting any of these heights, the height converter turns meters into feet and inches, and the landmarks hub ranks the Shard against every structure on this site.

A tower defined by its tip

The Shard's height has always been about more than a number. It was approved because of the quality of its design, nearly scrapped by a financial crisis, and named by its fiercest critics. Its tip is not a slender antenna but a sheaf of glass blades that never quite close, so that the building seems to dissolve into the sky. The open top also has a practical role: the spire's upper levels, known as the radiator floors, help vent heat from the building, so even the part of the tower that holds no people does useful work. Whether you use the developer's 309.6 m or CTBUH's 306 m, it remains the tallest building in Western Europe and the defining landmark of London's skyline south of the river.