"Take Four Canary Whary Towers. Tilt TWO Of Them At an angle so they lean over, crank another at 90° and stick it on the top of the first two, then crank the last and stick it on the bottom." Rory McGowan, structural engineer and director of multidisciplinary consultant Arup is trying to convey the sheer scale of the task he has been grappling with for the past two years. It is the headquarters for Central Chinese State Television and it looks like Ascending and Descending, MC Escher's perpetually rising/falling staircase. Its designer, Rem Koolhaas, is not the type of man to come up with something straightforward. This landmark building will be the flagship of a new complex for CCTV. The broadcaster needed the facilities to realise its ambition of rivalling other international networks, such as the BBC and CNN. The 553,000 m~2 complex is to be built in Beijing's new central business district and features the main 420,000 m~2 headquarters, which is envisaged as a complete television production community. It will house studios, production facilities and canteens, indeed everything required to make and sell television programmes. Next door is the Television Cultural Centre, also by Koolhaas' Office of Metropolitan Architecture. This is a public building containing a hotel, a theatre and conference rooms. Two other buildings on the site contain security and other services.
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