City Without Fear of Heigts

High-rise is in Rotterdam’s DNA. As early as 1898, the city attracted attention with Het Witte Huis, which at 43 m was considered Europe’s tallest office building at the time. Now, 125 years later, new insights and techniques have allowed the highest point of the Rotterdam skyline to run to more than 200 m. City without fear of heights takes stock of the past decades of high-rise construction and describes main lessons and learning points.

Urban designer Emiel Arends takes the reader up into the sky. All leading, iconic and innovative Rotterdam high-rise projects from four time periods are sketched. But we also look down, to the street. What is the positive contribution of high-rise buildings to themes such as the housing crisis, sustainability and quality of life? How can high-rise buildings contribute to solving the challenges of our time? City without fear of heights offers a complete overview of Rotterdam’s high-rise history, without losing sight of the human scale.