Europe's £587m tallest abandoned building that's been standing half-finished for 4 years

By Emily Wright, World News Reporter

This towering 800ft skyscraper has stood unfinished for four years. (Image: Getty)

Europe’s tallest abandoned building may finally be completed after standing half-finished for four years, as long as it gets enough funding. Construction of the German Elbtower began in 2021 but was halted in 2023 after the main financier, Rene Benko of Signa Holdings, went bankrupt. 

Now, Dieter Becken, 75, has taken on the challenge of finishing the skyscraper. He plans to rent out the ground-floor space to Hamburg’s Natural History Museum to raise the funds needed and is waiting to hear if the city’s authorities will accept the deal. Time is ticking, however, as Becken only has until April to raise the cash. 

Once completed, it will be the third tallest building in Germany at 800 feet. (Image: Getty)

According to estimates, the construction costs total some 700 million euros (£587 million) and was supposed to be an impressive 800 feet. However, the abandoned project currently stands at a less-impressive 328 feet. 

When completed, it will be 210 feet taller than the Gherkin and around 217 feet shorter than the Shard in London. It will be, by far, the tallest building in Hamburg and the third tallest in Germany - after the Commerzbank Tower and the Messeturm, both in Frankfurt. 

The half-finished skyscraper is located in Hamburg’s Hafen City district, near the city’s famous Elbphilharmonie concert hall. 

The site is bordered by several bridges crossing the Norderelbe river and marks the entrance to the inner city. 

It was set to host a Nobu hotel and restaurant, risk advisor Aon and a local bank. 

Elbtower will eventually tower some 64 storeys. (Image: Uwe Rohwedder)

The tower was designed by Christoph Felger from David Chipperfield Architects, an English architecture firm who built a lower high-rise hotel, the Empire Riverside Hotel, also in Hamburg.

The Elbtower’s footprint is roughly in the shape of an isosceles right triangle and will eventually tower some 64 storeys. 

Chancellor Olaf Scholz, then Mayor of Hamburg, championed the project, with the ruling SPD, CDU and FDP parties welcoming the plans. The Greens, meanwhile, were more skeptical. 

While standing at an impressive height, the Elbtower is not the tallest abandoned building in the world. This crown is taken by the Goldin Finance 117 building, which was originally set to become the fifth-tallest building in the world, part of an eyewatering £8 billion project.

Construction started in 2008 near China’s Tianjin business district and was planned to house 128 floors of housing, hotels and commercial space at a total height of 1,957 feet. As of March 2025, it remains unfinished and unoccupied.