Will these iconic towers work in Sri Lanka?

The skyline of Colombo has changed drastically over the past few years with a few iconic towers coming up in the city and its suburbs. In a transformational era such as this, Sri Lanka is open to several architectural marvels.

Lamudi Sri Lanka examines the cost of building an imitation of existing global architectural giants in Sri Lanka.

The Shard of London, UK. The building is the second tallest free-standing structure in the UK with 87 storeys made of 11,000 panels of glass. The Shard is a multiple-use building which has allocated space for residences, commercial practice and recreational facilities.

The 1,200,000 square feet structure in Colombo 1 (Fort) would cost around $300 million at an average rate of $250 per square feet. In comparison to the original cost of construction in London - £435 million - it could be much cheaper to construct in Colombo. The demand for office space and luxury residential properties is almost equally high.

Burj Khalifa of Dubai, is the world's tallest building. Burj Khalifa, standing tall at almost 830 metres into the sky, would bring a new definition to Sri Lanka if it is constructed in Colombo. The building has a floor space of 3,331,100 square feet.

Assuming square feet rates based on Jones Lang La Salle's research, if the Burj Khalifa was built between Colombo one and three, it would cost approximately $833 million while constructing it between Colombo 4 and 10 would cost essentially $520 million due to the difference in price per square feet.

The Burj consists of 900 residencies, 11 hectares of park, four-storey recreational facilities and other amenities. Such development in Sri Lanka would definitely boost tourism and might even make Colombo the biggest retail hub in South Asia. However, the investments would only be made by an elite group of Sri Lanka or foreign investors.

Managing Director, Lamudi Sri Lanka, Hugh van der Kolff said, "With proposed tourism target of two million and 2.5 million visitors by the end of 2015 and 2016, these imaginary projects might even double the number of expected tourist arrivals if constructed."

The Shimzu Mega City Pyramid of Tokyo. Skyscrapers do not necessarily have to be vertically built, but horizontally as well. The Shimzu Mega City Pyramid is proposed to be 2,000 metres tall and is to be a mixed-use development project.

Although, such a project would attract several retail investors and tourists, building such a project in Sri Lanka could surpass the supply rate.

In terms of residencies, it could house 750,000 people. However, several factors such as price, location and cost of living would be major deciding factors in a project as such this since the elite group is a much smaller number than the capacity of the pyramid.