As London is increasingly populated with hilariously tall buildings, we use our in-depth expert architectural nous to appraise the 100 loftiest of all.
Note: We've also thrown in a handful of structures, because lord knows we needed some diversity in the mix.
Another note: If you designed one of these things, remember this is a bit of fun. Please don't sue.
100. Stratosphere Tower: So called because it's the height of ugliness.
99. Empress State Building: Sorry but the Empire State Building is waaaay out of your league.
98. Conington Road: Colossal Pantone chart ranging from Bisto to piss.
97. Centre Point: Selfish fillet of mid-century land-grabbing. Why I adore it, then, I cannot say.
96. St. Helen's: Doomy inspiration for the Monolith in 2001: A Space Odyssey. Probably.
95. 25 Churchill Place: Looks more like a cheese grater than the Cheesegrater.
94. Millbank Tower: 1960s boomer with no time for woke shit like sky gardens. (Might get one when it becomes a 5-star hotel though.)
93. 40 Marsh Wall: Whoever awarded this Novotel 4 stars must've had their eyes shut on the way in.
92. Sky Gardens Nine Elms: Forever peering jealously over the (sky) garden fence at its neighbour with the swimming pool.
91. Alta at Consort Place: Someone hit Ctrl Alta Delete.
90. Pan Peninsula West Tower: The building that never grew up (to be as tall as Pan Peninsula East Tower).
89. 1 Casson Square: About as original as a South Bank busker playing Here Comes the Sun.
88. Chelsea Waterfront West Tower: Does it see its reflection in the water and weep?
87. Shakespeare Tower: Thou art more lovely and more temperate than most of the buildings on this list.
86. Lauderdale Tower: And another one!
85. Cromwell Tower: Brutalist things come in threes.
84. One The Elephant: Elephants don't deserve to be lumped in with this monstrosity. Should've been called One The Naked Mole-Rat.
83. The Founding: A building London's skyline could do with Losing.
82. Euston Tower: If ripping down the Victorian Euston station was the wound, then Euston Tower was very much the salt cellar.
81. One Crown Place South: Feels like it's about to merge into a Channel 4 ident.
80. No.9 Thames City: Glass podium with four medal positions. The architect comes fifth.
79. Sirocco Tower: You do not Sirocco my world.
78. Willis Building: Satisfyingly scalloped. My compliments to Bruce.
77. Two Fifty One: Trying too hard to make a point — literally.
76. The Stage: Should never have even made understudy.
75. Gladwin Tower: A Sadloss for anyone who appreciates decent architecture.
74. CityPoint: More like ShittyPoint, am I right?
73. One West Point Tower 2: The Oliver Hardy to One West Point Tower 1's Stan Laurel. Except the joke's firmly on us.
72. 10 George Street: Is it possible to be intensely insipid? Apparently so.
71. Keybridge Lofts: Jaunty redbrick Rubik's Cube, which I'm puzzled there aren't more like.
70. Cherry Park Building A1: The cherry on the cack.
69. 22 Ropemaker: Maybe they should have stuck to making ropes.
68. Valencia Tower: The architect clearly never went to Valencia.
67. Wembley Stadium: As iconic parabolas go, this is up there — 133 metres up there.
66. 150 High Street, Stratford: A titanic ship's funnel of a thing.
65. Chapter London Bridge: Judging a book by its cover, this actually looks very readable.
64. 101 George Street: If you're looking for an evil villain, I suggest you start here.
63. Saffron Square: If you're looking for an evil villain with a thing for Ribena, I suggest you start here.
62. Atlas: Angular eye-fuck of a building. A Magic Eye you can live in.
61. London Eye: Roundly brilliant. But it's very difficult to stay at the top for very long.
60. One Bishopsgate Plaza: The Nakatomi Plaza of Liverpool Street.
59. Charrington Tower: Gloriously glistening spine of glass.
58. 24 Marsh Wall East Tower: I won't be needing to see the West Tower, thank you.
57. 2 Trafalgar Way Tower 1: Proof that you don't need looks to find love; it's holding hands with the building next to it. Awww!
56. Imperial West Residential Building: Low res jpg of the Cheesegrater.
55. One Bank Street: Walkie-Talkie's weird cousin.
54. Manhattan Loft Gardens: Sounds like the kind of place Truman Capote would throw a cocktail party; looks like something he'd rather throw himself off the side of.
53. Maine Tower: The Maine thing is they're not building another one.
52. Strata SE1: Your flatmate's broken Gillette trimmer they refuse to chuck out.
51. Pan Peninsula East Tower: Practically begging to be panned.
50. Highpoint: Or as I like to call it... yeah, you got it.
49. Guy's Tower: Amazing things are happening inside this hospital building; not so much on the outside.
48. 10 Park Drive: More Pointless than Richard Osman with a particularly duff Eurovision song.
47. Baltimore Tower: When a skyscraper and an industrial chimney love each other very much, they make the Baltimore Tower.
46. Carrara Tower: Monumentally bland. Perhaps they should have made it out of marble.
45. South Bank Tower: To its credit, it makes the Southbank Centre look like the Taj Mahal.
44. 10 Upper Bank Street: Should've been built Upper Dark Street.
43. 40 Bank Street: Proof positive that anyone with a ruler can become a City of London architect.
42. 25 Bank Street: Didn't we just do this one?
41. College Road Tower A: Comically lanky, even for Croydon, but not without its crinkle-crankle charm.
40. River Park Tower: Asking ChatGPT to create the Barbican but considerably shitter.
39. One Churchill Place: If he knew you were going to do this with London, he might not have bothered defeating the Luftwaffe.
38. 40 Leadenhall Street: Hey, down in front! You're blocking the Gherkin!
37. One Thames Quay: Looked at this for three hours now, and there are just no words.
36. 20 Fenchurch Street aka the Walkie-Talkie: Hunched over in perpetual shame, even its architect disowned the poor bastard.
35. 50-60 Charter Street Tower 1: Going for that 'skyscraper after an earthquake' look.
34. Principal Tower: Not, presumably, because it's a principal actor, but because it's always in the principal's office.
33. Broadgate Tower: Broadly acceptable.
32. 1 Leadenhall Street: A mini city of jostling skyscrapers in itself.
31. Opus: Or as I call it, Oplus.
30. One Blackfriars: A smoothed-down sarcophagus of a thing, out of which a glassy mummy might spring at any second.
29. Wardian London West Tower: The architect got distracted halfway through and wandered off.
28. DAMAC Tower Nine Elms: Got drunk. Played Minecraft. Did this.
27. 100 Bishopsgate: Carved out of solid glass, but they ran out of budget as they approached the bottom.
26. One Thames City No. 8: A staggered step ladder of a high rise which I'm staggered ever got the thumbs up.
25. BT Tower: Whovian masterpiece thrusting from the heart of Fitzrovia like a middle finger to the corporate City Cluster yonder.
24. 40 Charter Street: I once had a CD rack that looked like this.
23. The Gherkin: A quaint olde skyscraper, believed to date back to Norman (Foster) times.
22. St George Wharf Tower: Why do I want to vape all of a sudden?
21. Amory Tower: "When that thing in the sky just makes you want to cry, that's Amory."
20. Tower 42: Electric razor you're never fitting in your hand luggage.
19. One West Point Tower One: The Stan Laurel to One West Point Tower 2's Oliver Hardy. Except... well you know the rest.
18. Wardian London East Tower: Not another one!
17. The Scalpel: Sharp, handsome, knows what it wants to be, doesn't give a fuck. The Jeremy Strong of buildings.
16. Harcourt Gardens: Think Kensington Gardens, then scrub it out of your brain with a Brillo until it bleeds, and you've got this place.
15. One Nine Elms City Tower: A remarkably stupid pair of twins; Tweedle Dum and Tweedle WTAF.
14. 8 Canada Square: Towering, formidable, unending, makes you feel small and powerless — an HSBC mortgage incarnate.
13. 25 Canada Square: Entirely nondescript were it not for the name badge. That person you frantically try to shake off at a networking event.
12. 8 Bishopsgate: So categorically nothingy, I can't even make out if this is an actual building.
11. One Park Drive: Straight out of Thunderbirds. Extortionate leasehold rates are GO!
10. South Quay Plaza 1: It's tall, I'll give it that.
9. Aspen at Consort Place: A giant toddler got bored and gave up on this after the third building block.
8. Crystal Palace Transmitter: The Eiffel Tower of south London — ooh la la!
7. Newfoundland: Industrial trellis. Only a fuck ton of clematises and a giant Francis Tophill could save this now.
6. 122 Leadenhall Street aka The Cheesegrater: Politely leans out of the St Paul's sightline, in the process consolidating its own mildly-iconic form.
5. Heron Tower: Home to a Great Glass Elevator catapulting you towards sushi, duck and waffles.
4. Landmark Pinnacle: Self-aggrandising name belies the dullest lunk of a building ever to (what's the opposite of grace?) London.
3. One Canada Square: Alan Sugar's pretend office. Constantly on the blink.
2. 22 Bishopsgate: Saw the towering City Cluster and said 'hold my pint'.
1. The Shard: Helping drunk south Londoners find their way home since 2012.
.jpg){kind=link}
.jpg){kind=link}
.jpg){kind=link}
.jpg){kind=link}
.jpg){kind=link}
.jpg){kind=link}
.jpg){kind=link}
