Durbach Block Jaggers Designs Australia's Thinnest Skyscraper: Pencil Tower Hotel Sydney

Year: 2021
Architects: Durbach Block Jaggers
Images: Durbach Block Jaggers

Australian architecture firm Durbach Block Jaggers has unveiled a design for the Pencil Tower Hotel in Sydney. Designed to be the country’s thinnest skyscraper, the project would rise at 410 Pitt Street with a height-to-width ratio of 16:1. With 173 hotel rooms with six suites on each floor, the 100-metre-high tower would be built in the downtown area with street frontage only 6.4 meters wide.

According to the team, the ‘pencil’ tower would rise on a low scale podium referencing the delicacy and detail of its heritage neighbors using the language of arching brickwork. A three story volume includes levels of lobby, cafe and lounge, visible through a large scale keyhole window, while a walled courtyard garden for shared use overlooks the street.
The tower was designed to simulate the compression and extension of a column through a continuous abstraction of its elements: base, shaft and capital. The capital is expressed as a flying balcony and shell curves of a rooftop sundeck, pool and “hammam” spa.

The designers explain that the facade would begin with compressed horizontal screening, slowly transforming into exaggerated verticals at the top. Horizontals begin wide and flush with the outside frame, slowly thinning and receding at the height of the tower.
“Each horizontal is at the height of the slab, handrail and door head height. Each floor houses compact hotel rooms, gathering light from the street, rear court or internal shapely voids. The voids are tiled to reflect light and colour into the rooms.” At the same time, keyhole windows would provide a framed vignette of the seamless tiled surface.