Robert Whitlock thought they had nailed it. A principal at architecture giant Kohn Pedersen Fox (KPF), Whitlock had been working on an exciting new project — the Beijing headquarters of CITIC, China’s powerful, state-owned conglomerate — and everyone seemed pleased with the design. The building was to be 528-meters tall — the largest building in China’s capital city — and the KPF architects had used the curvature of a zun, a ritual carafe from Bronze age China, for inspiration.

“If you think about this as a private commercial venture,” Whitlock reflected in a video for the Skyscraper Museum in February 2021, “the planners, the mayor, and I’m sure the premier, found intriguing the idea that the tower was meant to represent a vessel that was communal and for everyone in the city.” 

The design was elegant and unique, with a tapered waist and the bottom wall folding out slightly, like the hem of a dress. The result, Whitlock said, allowed the building to “levitate” off the ground, rather than striking down like “Excalibur’s metal.” 

But while CITIC was technically KPF’s client, Whitlock said that “half of the decision making” came from Beijing’s vice mayor and the city’s planning department. Some of these decisions were relatively minor and to be expected on such a large project, such as where the pinch point of the tower’s waist should be (the city wanted it above the other buildings in the skyline), but some were more challenging. 

“While the tower was under construction,” Whitlock recalled, “the vice mayor’s office contacted CITIC and said, ‘You have to redesign the top of your tower because it looks too Western. It should look more Chinese. Maybe it should even look like a traditional pagoda roof.’” 

Whitlock’s team spent four months in 2015 fighting against building a three-tiered roof on top of the skyscraper. But they were careful about it. Like many of the architects at KPF, Whitlock has extensive experience in China and knew the importance of having the Chinese government, not just the client, on his side. One of KPF’s signature buildings in China, the Shanghai World Financial Center, had even experienced something similar decades before. Its original design had a circular opening at the top, representing a traditional Chinese moon gate, but observers noted it resembled the rising sun of the Japanese flag. KPF ultimately changed the design to be a trapezoid.

Engaging in such compromises has come to be a KPF signature, as Whitlock showed in Beijing. Instead of giving in to the pagoda idea, Whitlock said, “We were able to convince them to follow the lines of a traditional Chinese roof,” with a slightly curved dip on each side of the top of the tower. 

Whitlock’s savvy is evident in how he talks about the ordeal even now — it “was actually a fortuitous request,” he said, because the end result allows for more “synergy” — and it is reflective of the attitude that has allowed KPF to thrive in China for more than 30 years. 

Among the handful of truly global architecture firms, the New York-based KPF has distinguished itself in China. While KPF is hardly alone — the American firm Gensler¹Gensler, for instance, designed the Shanghai Tower, the country’s tallest skyscraper also has a huge presence in China — KPF has completed or is actively working on more than 100 projects in Hong Kong and the mainland. Of its impressive portfolio — which includes Hudson Yards in New York, Azrieli Spiral Tower in Tel Aviv and Lotte Tower in Seoul — 40 percent of its projects are based in China. Some of China’s most iconic buildings were dreamed up and delivered by the 45-year-old firm, including the CITIC “Zun” Tower, Shanghai’s World Financial Center, Hong Kong’s International Commerce Center and Shenzhen’s Ping An Finance Center.

“You can definitely feel their presence in the skyline,” says Thomas Fisher, a professor in the College of Design at the University of Minnesota. “They have raised the bar in terms of what China expects from architects.” 

Indeed, as China “arrived” on the world stage, KPF was often the one building the set. Thanks to its ‘supertalls’ (buildings over 300 meters), KPF’s projects stand as glittering symbols of China’s record-defying achievements over the last few decades in business and wealth. Stats showing China’s incredible growth — like the fact that China is home to 10 of the world’s 20 tallest skyscrapers — could come with a footnote, such as that six of those skyscrapers were designed by KPF. 

“KPF got really good at partnering,” says Eric Howeler, an associate professor in architecture at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design, who worked at KPF from 1995–2003. “They were one of the first firms working globally, and they developed techniques and practices to do that. They learned how to collaborate.”

While the China-KPF collaboration is most visible in China’s skylines, it has also left its mark on KPF’s bottom line. Since its first completed project in China in 2000, the company has grown exponentially and brought in $216 million in revenue in 2020. Of its roughly 700 employees, approximately 20 percent are Chinese nationals, and the company says a significant portion of the firm’s revenue now comes from China. 

“Over time we have become more of a Chinese firm,” KPF president and design principal James von Klemperer tells The Wire. “You might find more architects in KPF worldwide, including in the New York office, that were born in Shanghai.”

That may be true, but KPF’s savvy will continue to be tested by the Chinese government, which has taken a decidedly nationalistic stance on the country’s aesthetic. Xi Jinping has made it known that he has opinions on the matter, most famously in 2014 when he criticized the uptick in “weird” architecture. Ever since, the stream of bold and eye-catching buildings that KPF and other international firms specialized in has slowed to a relative trickle. 

The debate over the CITIC tower roof was an early indication that things were changing, and several government rulings have since solidified it. In 2016, a government directive banned “oversized, xenocentric, and weird” buildings. And in 2021, the government put its foot down on skyscrapers — banning those over 500 meters and limiting those over 150 meters — and prohibited the construction of “ugly buildings.”

“China has transitioned from being the ‘playground for Western architects’ to a place that stands on its own,” says Javier Quintana de Uña, CEO of the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat. 

Given the changes, Xing Ruan, a professor of architecture and dean at the School of Design at Shanghai Jiao Tong University, says the question for firms like KPF is “whether or not they will use their opportunity and their success in China to rethink their architecture pursuit.” 

‘RICH IN SYMBOLISM’

From top left clockwise: SOHO Gubei in Shanghai, China Resources Tower in Shenzhen, Victoria Dockside in Hong Kong, and Genesis Beijing. Credit: KPF, Unsplash

In the early 15th century, the third emperor of the Ming Dynasty decided to move the capital 1,000 kilometers north, from Nanjing to Beijing, and began construction on the Forbidden City in 1406. With its perfect, concentric rectangles, which are rooted in Chinese symbolism of the heavens, he wanted “things to look a certain way,” says Sarah Moser, an associate professor of cultural and urban geography at McGill University.

“The whole history of human settlement is filled with cities or towns built from scratch in a very planned and strategic way, according to the values and ideologies of the people at the time,” she says. “The symbolism has changed over time — from royal cosmic symbolism to, more recently, symbols of capitalism and global spectacles — but it’s never really stopped.”

Indeed, the notion of starting fresh is incredibly appealing to leaders. Mao Zedong famously wanted to destroy the “four olds” (old customs, culture, habits and ideas) during the Cultural Revolution so that he could pave the way for a new China. (Premier Zhou Enlai is credited with sending troops to guard the Forbidden City from destruction during this time.) But after the economic reforms of Deng Xiaoping — known as the “General Architect” — a new “new China” emerged: one of private property, rapidly evolving economic development and private businesses eager to leave their mark. This combination proved especially seductive to architects.

“Moving towards parts of the world that are transforming themselves is a natural, practical instinct for architects,” says von Klemperer. “As nice as it is to work in an 18th century city in Europe, you probably shouldn’t do much to disturb those environments. Fast growth areas are, by their nature, interesting to architects.” 

Still, when KPF, which was founded in 1976, first pivoted to Asia, it was more running away from a U.S. economic slowdown, rather than toward what would become the world’s fastest growing economy.

Eugene Kohn, KPF’s founding president, has said that the firm’s U.S. projects were slowing down in the mid 1980s. On a podcast, he recalled going to a conference in 1985 where a panelist said, “If you’re not global by 1990, you’ll be out of business.” Kohn took the warning seriously. The firm first turned to London (where they built the new European headquarters on Fleet Street for Goldman Sachs) and Germany. The firm then looked to Japan, where they won the contract to build the JR Central Towers and Nagoya Station in 1989. 

“That opened the door to Asia,” Kohn has said, noting that the partners would often fly to Hong Kong from Japan to save money as they scouted new opportunities.

By the early 1990s, KPF was meeting with officials and architects in Shanghai to discuss plans for the Shanghai World Financial Center — the design with the ill-fated circle. Of the early days, von Klemperer recalls, “It was like the Wild West. … We found ourselves starting from scratch.” 

The Shanghai World Financial Center wouldn’t be completed until 2008 — the Asian financial crisis in 1997 delayed things — but KPF had its foot in China’s door. By 2000, foreign projects made up 40 percent of the firm’s billings, and that year, KPF completed its first project in China: Plaza 66, a mixed-use and luxury re-imagination of Shanghai’s commercial center on Nanjing Road. 

“It was immediately clear that this would be a rewarding process — that our skills would be put to good use, and that we would be paired with very talented Chinese architects,” says von Klemperer, who was the lead designer on Plaza 66. “It seemed as if we were part of a national effort to advance city building in China.”

Indeed, by 2001, the International Olympic Committee had announced Beijing as home to the 2008 Summer Olympics, setting off a frenzy of developments and modernization efforts. In 2007, a Real Estate Weekly article noted that the quality of architecture in China had improved by a generation in only five years, and that “western architects are being given the opportunity to perform structural gymnastics designing shapes that many would never dare to try and complete in New York.”

China, after all, was trying to send a message to cities like New York. When the Shanghai World Financial Center opened, an article in the Shanghai Daily noted that the tower, then the second tallest in the world at 492 meters, was “rich in symbolism.” 

“Its height represents the success of Shanghai’s development and confidence in the future,” the article said. 

The confidence was certainly warranted. By 2009, as the global financial crisis hit, KPF’s projects around the world were being stalled — but not in China. China alone represented 50 percent of KPF’s business at that time, and it had exciting projects in the works, like the 484-meter ICC in Hong Kong and the 533-meter Chow Tai Fook Finance Center in Guangzhou.

Cole Roskam, associate professor of architectural history at Hong Kong University, says the “intense development, design and construction [in China] continued largely unabated,” until the early 2010s. He marks the Shanghai Expo, in 2010, as a turning point. “After the Expo, there was almost a kind of fatigue that set in — an exhaustion in a way.”

‘SUITABLE, ECONOMIC, GREEN & PLEASING TO THE EYE’

Xi Jinping characterized the fatigue best when, on October 15, 2014, at a symposium on culture, the new president reportedly said there should be “no more weird architecture.” The playground for western architects had, indeed, resulted in a wide spectrum of avante garde designs, from Dutch architect Rem Koolhaus’s CCTV headquarters, nicknamed “Big Pants” by Beijing residents for its resemblance to trousers, to Iraqi-British architect Zaha Hadid’s Galaxy SOHO, which is shaped like a cluster of alien pods and incensed Beijing’s preservation society.

By 2016, Xi’s opinion had been codified. The State Council and the Communist Party’s Central Committee issued a directive saying new architecture should not be “oversized, xenocentric, weird” or devoid of cultural tradition. Instead, buildings should be “suitable, economic, green and pleasing to the eye.” 

The xenocentric element was likely aimed at the multiple replicas of foreign landmarks, like the White House and the Arc de Triomphe, that had cropped up, but KPF, while on the more conservative side of things, was not immune to criticism. The trapezoid top of the Shanghai World Financial Center, for instance, was said to make it look like a bottle opener. And as the ordeal over the “too western” top on CITIC Tower showed, KPF’s skyscrapers were expected to look more obviously Chinese.

It’s not just a rejection of foreign architecture… It’s recognizing the cost and the material waste that’s going into a lot of these projects.

Cole Roskam, associate professor of architectural history at Hong Kong University

Skyscrapers, many architects note, are a decidedly American idea. As recently as 1990, 81 percent of the world’s tallest 100 buildings were in North America, according to the Council on Tall Buildings and Habitat. As beacons of office space glamor, the structures have come to be synonymous with the corporations and global capitalist pursuits they house and often stand as symbols of a city’s economic progress. As China developed, the connection between cities and skyscrapers was an important one. 

“If you read [the Chinese Communist Party’s] five year plans, you’ll find that there’s an assumption that urbanization comes with economic growth,” notes Stefan Al, author of the new book Supertall: How the World’s Tallest Buildings Are Reshaping Our Cities and Our Lives, and a former KPF employee. “They deliberately chose this more urban or relatively high density mode of development. These extremely tall towers are a symptom of that, because they’re images of modernity that cities aspire to.” 

For five years straight, from 2014–2019, the tallest completed building in the world was in China. But some say China didn’t fully realize the changes that would result from this kind of development. Xing, at Shanghai Jiaotong University, says tall towers mark a stark contrast from courtyards, which is how Chinese society was traditionally organized.

“A courtyard is essentially a building where you face inside. There’s very little opening to the outside, and you get air and light from an internal court,” he says. High rise buildings, by contrast, “once you get in, you face outside. The feeling is the space beyond — the horizon. That’s the fundamental change.” 

In 2021, China first restricted and then outright banned the construction of skyscrapers over 500 meters and prohibited the construction of “ugly buildings.” It also restricted skyscrapers taller than 150 meters in cities with less than 3 million people and skyscrapers taller than 250 meters in more populous cities. 

“It’s not just a rejection of foreign architecture,” notes Roskam. “It’s recognizing the cost and the material waste that’s going into a lot of these projects. There’s an element of sustainability that begins to ripple out [from the government directives], and it’s produced somewhat of a chilling effect.”

When it comes to navigating the government’s increased say in things, KPF may have seen the writing on the 528-meter wall of CITIC Tower. Observers note the firm is skillful at staying apolitical and has managed to emerge relatively unscathed by the political tensions that make operating in China difficult for many American companies. In fact, while the firm’s initial projects in China were primarily for private businesses and investors, its portfolio has gravitated in recent years to include more state-owned enterprises.

“Our advantage up to now is we generally have support from the government side,” says Rebecca Cheng, KPF’s principal in its Shanghai office. “We have balanced the needs from the planning bureaus, which are more public-interest orientated, versus the development interests from the investor side.”

One reason why KPF has more projects in Shanghai than in Beijing, Cheng adds, is because there is no Beijing KPF office. “In China, you need insider information,” she says.

Indeed, as China’s love affair with skyscrapers wanes, the firm seems to be a step ahead in its attempts to diversify. This year, for example, KPF is expected to complete NYU Shanghai’s new 1.2-million-square-foot campus, which integrates “NYU’s mission to provide a liberal arts education with the Chinese desire for more specialized programs,” according to KPF. 

von Klemperer described it as “a major societal event,” but it was also a major event for KPF, which is trying to expand its work on college campuses in China. The firm is currently building Hong Kong University of Science and Technology’s 267-acre campus in Guangzhou, which it says will be cutting-edge.

“It’s very future looking,” says Bernard Chang, a principal at KPF’s Hong Kong office, adding that it’s the biggest project he’s worked on in a decade. “We are helping them to reimagine what a tech campus will be and could be.”

The campus is also “targeting carbon neutrality,” a significant goal for both KPF and the Chinese government. KPF has promised to design and deliver carbon neutral buildings by 2030, and many of its recent projects — from Lenovo’s new headquarters to the 452-meter Suzhou International Finance Square — boast sustainability and innovation as core features. 

But no matter how “green” or forward-looking these new projects are, McGill University’s Moser says there is a large gap between the rhetoric and the reality. 

“Anything built before the current era will be more sustainable on balance,” she says, “because any new construction, by definition, will have a larger carbon debt. The greenest thing you can do is retrofit.”

Xing agrees, bemoaning what he sees as a larger “mentality change” around building in China. 

“The Chinese have been largely and badly influenced by American culture, consumer culture,” he says. “When you treat architecture as a commodity, you want it to change all the time.” 

While it was the ‘start from scratch’ appeal that first excited von Klemperer about working in China, he seems sensitive to the criticism, acknowledging that the climate in China has changed. KPF, he says, is actively trying to be involved in more projects that retrofit buildings. 

“It’s about appreciating and saving buildings in their historical context — that’s really important for the artistic and cultural identity of a place,” he says. “These days, there’s a little bit less of a ‘wipe the slate clean’ attitude.” 

---