The 250m-tall, 55-storey Mohammed VI Tower has been inaugurated on the right bank of the Bouregreg river in Rabat, becoming Morocco’s tallest building.
Designed and built by a joint venture of Belgian contractor Besix and Casablanca’s TGCC, the building’s silhouette, visible from 50km away, suggests a rocket on a launch pad.
The structure has 102,800 sq m of floor space and contains a luxury hotel, offices, residences and a panoramic observation deck. It houses 36 lifts, 21 in the tower and 15 in the podium.
The tower rests on 60m-deep foundations made of 104 concrete barrettes, able to withstand seismic activity and flooding.
The tower combines a high-strength inner concrete core with an outer structural steel frame, laterally distributing loads with the tube-in-tube method.
A 160-tonne mass damper system is installed at the crown to reduce wind and seismic movement.
The tower’s façade is designed to reduce solar heat gain and cooling energy.
The podium roof has 2,200 sq m of photovoltaic panels and the south façade has 1,800 sq m of panels.
Architects Rafael de la Hoz and Hakim Benjelloun worked on the project, which was developed by O Capital Group.
In 2022, Besix announced it would use the autonomous “BIMPrinter” topographic robot to trace floor plans at the tower, mimicking the outlines of partition walls with complex geometry straight onto floor slabs, guided by the digital model of the building.
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