Calatrava's 'Turning Torso' selected best new skyscraper

The Swedish Skyscraper "Turning Torso," designed by Santiago Calatrava, has been chosen the best new skyscraper for 2005 by the editors of Emporis, a real estate data provider.

The jury bestowed the sixth annual Emporis Skyscraper Award to Calatrava's creation in Malmö because it "is a new model for flexible design in skyscrapers." The jury added: "Turning Torso gives an iconic presence to the skyline of Sweden's third-largest city, visible in the distance from Copenhagen in Denmark."

At 623 feet tall, Turning Torso is the tallest building in Scandinavia, and the tallest residential building west of Moscow in Europe.

The building is formed by stacking nine cubes, five stories each, rotating each cube about 11 degrees from the one below it, and holding the twisting formation together with an exterior skeleton on two sides. From bottom to top, the building completes a 90-degree turn.

The stacked cubes are a interpretation of modular skyscraper designs by brutalist architects of the 1960s, and foreshadow later designs, including Calatrava's unbuilt plan for 80 South Street in New York City.

Runners-up for the award were the 78-story Q1 Tower in Gold Coast City, Australia, and the 43-story Montevideo tower in Rotterdam, The Netherlands.