Keeping up to date with contemporary architectural trends is like watching a science fiction movie. Leaning towers, spiral buildings, the world's longest skyscraper, a structure that hangs from an asteroid — what's next? Add super skinny towers to the list, and expect to see them popping up soon. Sure, not the most earth-shattering idea ever, but they're tall, thin, and there are plans to build one on the Gold Coast.

A development application has been lodged for a new $200m project at 2 Wharf Road, Surfers Paradise, aiming to place a block of narrow apartments as close to the beach as possible. The 42-floor building would include a detached three-storey townhouse, 35 single-floor units, a two-storey sub-penthouse and a three-storey penthouse. A space called a 'neighbourhood store' will also feature.

For those pondering aerodynamics — a reasonable concern when you put a skinny structure in a place where it'll be constantly battered by the sea gusts — the application claims that the design has been "optimised to reduce wind loads on the tower". It's proposed that the building's diagrid exoskeleton will "add torsional stiffness", aka make sure it doesn't twist and bend. You'd hope so.

Don't go thinking that popping a huge grid over the outside will infringe on the apartments' scenic vistas, however, as every floor boasts two balconies. Sure, the tower looks like it could get knocked over by a breath of air at any moment, but it'll have one heck of a view.

Via Brisbane Development. Images: Rothelowman.

Published on April 13, 2017 by Sarah Ward