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AssetID: 36727173

Headline: Inside Singapore's Brand New £1.2 Billion Pound Airport That Features The World's Largest Indoor Waterfall

Caption: These images show the luxury complex featured inside Shanghai's brand new £1.2 billion airport. The 1.7 million-square-foot Jewel, which sits on the site of a former surface parking lot and connects to three of the airport’s four terminals, features the world's largest indoor waterfall. Apple have also recently announced they are to open their second store within the complex and will host photo walks around the building. Inside the perimeter of shops and restaurants that Apple now calls home, a 40-meter tall Rain Vortex forms the focal point of a garden called Forest Valley. The green space takes the form of an 80-foot-tall stepped elliptical void that is topped with a “canopy park” with follies such as a topiary walk, a mirrored maze, and a glass-bottomed bridge. The glass-domed hub has already become a landmark in Singapore and a photography hotspot. Encircling the valley on four levels above grade and two below (with 2,500 subterranean parking spaces below that), are a shopping mall, a movie theatre, a hotel, and other traveller conveniences. These amenities are kept separate from the green space, but the designers sliced slot-like “canyons” through the valley bowl, providing visual connections between the two distinct environments. Conscious of the disorienting potential of buildings with round footprints, Safdie Architects have also arranged the cuts to provide views to the outside, including one aligned with the air traffic control tower. The vortex, designed by the water feature specialists WET, drops up to 10,000 gallons per minute down seven stories and is Jewel’s most popular selfie spot. The airport is part of a set of long-range projects that aim to increase the airport’s capacity from 65 million to 135 million passengers by 2030, including a third runway and a terminal designed by Heatherwick Studio, KPF, and Architects 61. The aspiration for Jewel was not only to entice more people to travel through Changi, but also build upon its curious popularity among Singaporeans as a destination in its own right - a place readily accessible to the rest of the island via mass transit, where the non-travelling public can shop, eat, and spend leisure time.

Keywords: feature story,photo feature,airport,design,tech,technology,architecture

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