Qualla: Gran Torre Costanera

Gran Torre Costanera: Introduction

Sun, 21 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Alexander.Ramis, CC BY-SA 3.0. Locals just call it El Costanera, dropping the formalities for the tower everyone in Santiago can find on the skyline. At 300 metres and 64 storeys, it is the tallest building in South America, a tapering shaft of glass that catches the morning light off the Andes and throws a shadow more than a kilometre long across the city. It was the last major work of Argentine architect César Pelli, the man behind Kuala Lumpur's Petronas Towers, and it gave a mid-latitude capital better known for earthquakes than for skyscrapers a genuine landmark to call its own.

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Image: Alexander.Ramis | CC BY-SA 3.0

Gran Torre Costanera: A Tower for the Southern Cone

Sun, 21 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Mulatoenchile, CC BY-SA 3.0. Gran Torre Costanera anchors the Costanera Center, a complex that also holds the largest shopping mall in Latin America, two hotels, and a pair of additional office towers. The skyscraper itself stands 300 metres tall with 64 floors above ground and six basement levels below. Pel...

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Image: Mulatoenchile | CC BY-SA 3.0

Gran Torre Costanera: Stalled, Then Skyward

Sun, 21 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit 3BRBS, CC BY-SA 3.0. The tower nearly never finished. Construction began in 2006, but the global financial crisis froze the project in January 2009, leaving an unfinished concrete stump looming over Santiago, a stark monument to a recession reaching all the way to the Southern Cone. Work resumed on 1...

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Image: 3BRBS | CC BY-SA 3.0

Gran Torre Costanera: The View from the Top

Sun, 21 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Dario Alpern, CC BY-SA 3.0. On 11 August 2015, the tower opened its summit to the public. The observation deck, called Sky Costanera, occupies floors 61 and 62 and offers a full 360-degree panorama, the highest viewpoint in Latin America. The 61st floor is enclosed behind glass; the 62nd is an open-air terr...

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Image: Dario Alpern | CC BY-SA 3.0

Gran Torre Costanera: Landmark and Lightning Rod

Sun, 21 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit gaspar abrilot from Santiago, Chile, CC BY-SA 2.0. Not everyone welcomed it. Critics worried about a glass giant casting a mile-long shadow over a low-rise city, and the project drew its share of foreboding headlines as it rose. Yet the tower has settled into Santiago's identity the way landmarks tend to, becoming the backdrop of...

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Image: gaspar abrilot from Santiago, Chile | CC BY-SA 2.0