Global Construction Watch

At first glimpse the Central markets development looks like a structure off a scene in the Matrix. But it’s surprisingly going to be built in Astana, capital of Kazakhstan, an ex-soviet, landlocked oil rich country. Another ingenious design from architects Foster + Partners, Central markets would be a mini-city development with a staggered matrix of buildings designed to look like a three dimensional bar chart comprising of a retail/leisure podium and hotel cluster at its base and then a series of office and residential towers to its north.

Standing at a huge 382m (1273 feet) over 88-storeys, intricately designed Central markets would classify as a supertall, by. At the base of the development there are plans to build a “traditional” Kazakh market in the retail/leisure podium and a specially solar insulated winter garden the size of a football pitch with an adjusted temperature of 10C (50F) in the chilling Kazakh winters of -30C.

According to a senior partner at Foster and Partners, Gerard Evenden, Central markets is

a pure expression of environmentally sensitive design … the towers are clustered together to conserve energy like penguins huddling in the winter,”

Kazakhstan’s president Nursultan Nazarbayev, has renamed Central markets, Abu Dhabi Plaza after it was gifted to Sheikh Khalifa Bin Zayed, president of the United Arab Emirates. It will be developed by a Kazakh-Abu Dhabi corporation of ALDAR Properties & Al Maabar.

Here are a couple of rendered images of some impressive structures to be put up in Kazakstan’s capital city Astana: