Taj Mahal vs Kingdom Centre

Informations

The Taj Mahal (; lit. 'Crown of the Palace', [ta?d? ?m???(?)l]) is an ivory-white marble mausoleum on the southern bank of the river Yamuna in the Indian city of Agra. It was commissioned in 1632 by the Mughal emperor Shah Jahan (reigned from 1628 to 1658) to house the tomb of his favourite wife, Mumtaz Mahal; it also houses the tomb of Shah Jahan himself. The grave is the centrepiece of a 17-hectare (42-acre) complex, which includes a mosque and a guest house, and is set in formal gardens bounded on three sides by a crenellated wall. Building of the mausoleum was basically completed in 1643, but work continued on other stages of the job for the following 10 years. The Taj Mahal complex is believed to have been completed in its entirety in 1653 at a cost estimated at the time to be approximately 32 million rupees, which in 2020 will be approximately 70 billion rupees (about U.

S. $916 million). The construction project employed some 20,000 artisans under the guidance of a board of architects led by the court architect to the emperor, Ustad Ahmad Lahauri. The Taj Mahal was designated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1983 for being'the jewel of Muslim art in India and one of the universally admired masterpieces of the world's heritage'. It is viewed by many as the best example of Mughal architecture and a symbol of India's rich history. The Taj Mahal attracts 7--8 million visitors annually and in 2007, it had been announced a winner of the New 7 Wonders of the World (2000--2007) initiative.

Source: Wikipedia

Informations

Kingdom Centre (Arabic: ???? ????????) is a 99-story, 302.3 m (992 ft) skyscraper in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. When completed in 2002, it overtook the 267-meter Faisaliyah Tower as the tallest tower in Saudi Arabia. It has since been surpassed and has become the fifth-tallest skyscraper in the nation, whose tallest two buildings are the Abraj Al Bait Towers and the Capital Market Authority Tower. It is the world's third-tallest building with a hole following the Shanghai World Financial Center and the 85 Sky Tower in Taiwan. The mixed-use tower was created by Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal and designed by the group of Ellerbe Becket and Omrania, who were selected through an international design competition. It is situated on a 100,000--square-metre website and houses the 57,000-square-meter Al-Mamlaka shopping mall, offices, the Four Seasons Hotel Riyadh, and luxury apartments. There is a 65m skybridge atop the skyscraper.The upper third of the tower features an inverted parabolic arch topped by a public sky bridge. The sky bridge is a 300-ton steel construction, taking the kind of an enclosed corridor with windows on either side. After paying the entrance fees, visitors take two elevators to reach that level.

Source: Wikipedia