Urban Inspiration

Impressive buildings, huh? These are some of the architectural forms that inspire my descriptions in The Red King Chronicles on Protagonize. I think I'm doing a fairly decent job describing the setting, but a picture is worth a thousand words, right? So I'm taking this opportunity to bump up my word count by at least 5000. Rad!

Anyway, if you're interested in delving deeper into the buildings above, here's some info for you.

The first one show the Almaty Twin Towers in Kazakhstan, a Norman Foster design. As far as I know, this project is still in the proposal stage.

The second photo might be familiar to those of you who participated in the first Seasonal Prose Competition. A different angle of the same mega-structure was used as part of the logo for the SPC10, which can be found here. It's called Crystal Island, and is another Normal Foster creation. Located in Moscow, it will be the largest building in the world if constructed.

Third up is the Gazprom Tower in St. Petersburg, a project that has the go-ahead but is being met with huge resistance. Why? As the tallest building in Europe, it would dwarf the current skyline icon of St Petersburg: the St. Peter and Paul Basilica. The controversy continues with a UNESCO decision to strip the heritage site designation of the city if the tower is built. You have to admit it's gorgeous, though.

The fourth photo depicts a site particularly close to my heart: Reflections at Keppel Bay, a new neighbourhood in Singapore. I could actually see the Daniel Libeskind designed towers from my 19th storey bedroom window in Singapore, and along with the Marina Bay Sands Resort Casino were one of the first iconic buildings I saw after landing at 5am. The shapes are surreal, and the rise from a forest is something I really wish to capture in my writing.

Fifthly, another Russian-based Norman Foster design, Russia Tower was to be one of the tallest buildings in the world. Construction started in 2007, was halted in 2009, and has since been officially cancelled. Several smaller buildings are now planned for the development site, with a project completion date of 2015.

So there you go, a couple images to help you visualize what Auburg looks like. I'm currently working on chapter six, which will explore more of the city, so keep an eye out for that if you've been following the story! On that note, I better get back to my draft. Cheers!

all photos from InHabitat.com