User:Mike.BRZ/sandbox

The  Torre KOI is a 65-story skyscraper in the northern mexican city of San Pedro Garza Garcia, a suburb of Greater Monterrey. Designed by VFO Arquitectos with consulting by Thornton Tomasetti and RWDI, it is the center piece of the VAO complex, a mixed-use development combining office, residential and retail space, among the first of its kind in the city. Standing 279.1 m upon completion in 2017 it became the tallest building in Mexico and marked the first time in the country's history where the tallest building was not located in the capital, Mexico City.

Planning & Design
In february of 2007 real state development firm IDEI launched a design competition for a mixed-use development that could serve as a symbol of the economic progress of the city of Monterrey. The winner was the architectural firm V&FO (then known as HOK Mexico) with a proposal for a 40-story tower combining office, residential and retail space, simply known as "Torre 40". With a projected height between 180 - 200 m, the plan was for the building to become the tallest and largest building in Greater Monterrey, with a floor area of 90,000 m2, construction will take place in a 2 ha tract of land in the suburb of San Pedro Garza Garcia and have a cost of $80 million USD. Later tha year however, IDEI adquired a bigger tract of land further south along Lazaro Cardenas avenue, the larger 3 ha site to work allowed the project to evolve into a complex of 5 buildings under the name VAO. In may of 2008, it was among the first ever developments to be awarded mixed-use zoning in the city. Work on the first building in the development commenced shortly after.

In 2011 the final master plan of the complex was unvelied, comprising 327,534 m2 of built floor area across 4 buildings; the already completed VAO Offices, the still under construction Liu West and Liu East residential towers and the newly named fourth and final building, Torre KOI, a 56-story skyscraper standing 232 m now aiming to become the tallest in the country, surpassing the height of the then tallest Torre Mayor in Mexico City. Torre KOI was to have 33,000 m2 of leasable office space in the lower floors and 235 apartments in the upper ones. Over the course of the next two years and before groundwork began, overall plans for Torre KOI remained largely the same but the building saw further increases in height, first to 252 m then 267 m and finally 276 m. At this point the cost of Torre KOI was expected to be $200 million USD and $385 million for the whole VAO complex.

Construction
To construct the foundation of the Torre Koi, it was necessary to conduct the largest casting of concrete for a building in Mexico at the time. This required the continuous pumping of concrete during 48 hours, starting on Saturday, December 21, 2013 at 8:00 am, concluding the following Monday morning. The foundation plate is 50 by in dimension and further anchored to the ground through 78 piles 1.6 m in diameter and 7 m deep. The plate itself is 4 m thick and required 8000 m3 of concrete to erect it. Twelve hundred concrete-carrying trucks were used for this work. Cemex, the supplier of concrete for the structure, devoted seven of its production plants exclusively to the casting for the foundation of the Torre Koi.

Features
The 64-story building contains 27 floors with 39000 m2 of office space along with 218 apartments and 18 penthouses across the upper 37 floors, ranging from 130 to 832 m2. Each apartment has access to its own storage space and 2 or 3 parking spaces. Furthermore, residents enjoy communal amenities on the 22nd floor, which include an infinity pool, a bar, a sauna, a private guest room, and more. The project was certified LEED BD+C Silver in May 2018.