Taipei 101 Gets New Neighbors

choi

'孤独巨人' 台北101不再孤单. 纽约时报中文网, July 12, 2017
https://cn.nytstyle.com/real-est ... taipei-skyscrapers/

, which is translated from

Chris Horton, Taipei's Lonely Giant Is Getting Some Company; An impressive, and harmonious, skyline begins to emerge in a surprisingly low-rise city. New York Times, July 12, 2017.

Note:
(a) Taipei as "a surprisingly low-rise city"

The assessment surprises me. City of Boston (where I live) along with towns of Cambridge and Brookline are low-rise, but that is due to zoning laws imposed on the mass. See

Does Boston limit the maximum height of buildings?  Neighboring Cambridge does cap building heights
https://www.quora.com/Does-Bosto ... height-of-buildings
(Devin Cole answered on Oct 16, 2013: "The City's zoning code has a blanket height restriction of 155 feet [47 meters]. The code is here: Zoning - Boston Redevelopment Authority.  Building can be taller than 155 feet, but must go through the Zoning Board of Appeals for a variance")

* variance (n): "a license to do some act contrary to the usual rule  <a zoning variance>"
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/variance
(b) "The Taipei 101 building, which was for five years [2004-2008] the world's tallest * * * Very much a build-it-and-they-will-come venture, the 1,666.7-foot [508-meter; 101-story] tower was erected in one of the city's least built-up areas, Xinyi District 信義區, as a symbol of a modern and ambitious Taiwan.  Thirteen years later, Xinyi is Taipei's center for finance, business, offices and shopping."

Except the first clause, it is untrue; the District has been a commercial center.

choi

(c) "the 48-story, 892-foot Nan Shan Plaza 「臺北南山廣場」[which is the building under construction  to the left of Taipei 101, in the only photo of the report], is scheduled for completion at the end of this year. Already topped out * * * The project takes its name from Nan Shan Life Insurance [Co, Ltd 南山人壽保險股份有限公司; founded in Taipei in 1963, acquired by American International Group, Inc (AIG) in 1970, which sold it to a Taiwanese company in 2011]. Nan Shan won rights to a 50-year lease of the former site of Taipei World Trade Center's Hall 2 [2 館] with an $894 million bid [Taipei City Government retains the ownership of the 2 館 land]. * * * The main building [of 南山廣場], an elongated triangle, is intended to represent two hands pressed together as a gesture of thanks and prayer 「祈福」 for Taiwan's continued good fortune, said the project's architect, Yasuhiro SUBE 須部 恭浩, of the Tokyo-based Mitsubishi Jisho Sekkei [Inc 株式会社 三菱地所設計 -- a subsidiary of Mitsubishi Group]."
(i)
(A) top out: "to reach the highest amount or level and stop increasing —often + at  <Interest rates are expected to top out at 15 percent>"
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/top%20out

The oxforddictionaries.com has the same definition.
(B) However, the term has a specific meaning in architecture. See topping out
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Topping_out
(ii) Taipei World Trade Center  台北世界貿易中心
https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/台北世界貿易中心
(built and owned by 中華民國對外貿易發展協會; is made up of 展覽大樓 (1館; completed in 1986) and 展覽3館 (completed in 2003) )
(iii) from the Web: "TWTC Hall 2 was completed on November 26, 1999.” Hall 2 was then torn down in 2013, following later that same year by Nan Shan Plaza breaking ground.

What  a waste!
(iv) Japanese-English dictionary:
* jisho or chisho  地所 【じしょ; ちしょ】 (n): "estate; plot of land"

(d) "Nan Shan Plaza * * * bookends the pedestrian- and bike-friendly retail zone stretching between it and Taipei 101, which [is] just a stone’s throw to its west * * * A block north is the Taipei City Hall subway station, which is dominated by the Breeze Songgao and Shin Kong Mitsukoshi mall complexes"
(i) This is a bookend.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bookend

The first sentence means that the Plaza and Taipei will bracket the retail zone.
(ii) 微風廣場
https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/微風廣場
(Breeze SONG GAO 微風松高 is the name of a department store on 松高路 in Breeze Center 微風廣場)
(iii) Shin Kong Group 新光集團 (kong is Taiwanese pronunciation for 光) and Mitsukoshi, Ltd 株式会社三越 Shin Kong Mitsukoshi has collaborated to open many department stores in Taiwan, including three in City of Taipei.

(e) "The Nan Shan team's initial success in signing [as a tenant] the Executive Centre, a serviced office provider"

Founded in 1994 and based in Hong Kong, Executive Centre Limited provides serviced (ie, furnished) offices in East Asia.

(f) "The Fubon Group Xinyi Headquarters design is a collaboration by the Renzo Piano Building Workshop — the firm behind The New York Times Building and the Whitney Museum in New York, and the Shard in London — and the Taiwanese architect Kris Yao's 姚仁喜 firm, Kris Yao Artech 大元建築工場"
(i) Renzo Piano
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renzo_Piano
(1937- , an Italian architect)
(A) Renzo
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renzo
(B) The Italian surname Piano refers to "someone who lived on a plain or plateau, Italian piano (Latin [noun neuter] planum [a plane, level ground], from the adjective planus flat, level"
(C)
* "piano" can be a noun in English, and either an adjective or a noun in Italian.
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/piano
* English dictionary:

piano (adv or adj; n -- for the latter, read etymology: "from the fact that its [piano's] tones could be varied in loudness")
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/piano
(ii) The New York Times Building
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_York_Times_Building
(completed in 2007)
(iii) Whitney Museum of American Art
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whitney_Museum_of_American_Art
(founded in 1931 by Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney [a great granddaughter of Cornelius Vanderbilt]; in 2014 relocated to a new building designed by Renzo Piano)
(iv) The Shard
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Shard