page_title: Mercury City Tower
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Mercury City Tower / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Mercury City Tower in Moscow, made in AutoCAD
context_page_description: Mercury City Tower is a supertall skyscraper located on plot 14 in the Moscow International Business Center in Moscow, Russia. Occupying a total area of 173,960 square metres, the mixed-use building houses offices, apartments, a fitness center, and retail stores.
  Rising 338.8 m tall, the Mercury City Tower was formerly the tallest building of Russia and Europe, having surpassed the Moscow Tower of the neighboring City of Capitals complex as the tallest of Russia and The Shard in London as Europe's tallest building. The Mercury City Tower kept this record from late 2012 to the summer of 2014, in which it was surpassed by the South Tower of the neighboring OKO complex as the tallest building in Russia and Europe.
context_section_description: Mercury City Tower was jointly developed by the American architect Frank Williams and the Russian engineering team Mosproject-2 under the leadership of architect Mikhail Posokhin. After the death of Williams in 2010, the Russians were able to convince Dutch architect Erick van Egeraat to succeed him and thus finish Williams' work.
  Construction of Mercury City Tower began in 2006. The project was estimated to be completed by 2009, but developers Mercury Development and Liedel Investments Limited preferred to slow down the project in order to not bring the building to the housing market during the Great Recession. By 21 April 2009, Mercury City Tower had just finished foundation work: finishing earthworks and five underground floors, and was ready for construction over ground. The estimated completion date was then pushed to 2010.
  On 1 November 2012, the Mercury City Tower topped out at 338.8 m (1,112 ft), overtaking the Moscow Tower of the neighboring City of Capitals complex as the tallest building of Russia and The Shard in London as tallest building of Europe. It also became the world's tallest building built of reinforced concrete.
  Construction was finished in 2013.
  On the summer of 2014, the South Tower of the neighboring OKO complex surpassed the Mercury City Tower as the tallest building in Russia and Europe as well as the tallest building built of reinforced concrete.
  Construction was conducted with the help of a US$300 million loan from Sberbank, which created the ground for speculation about the possible transition of the building into ownership of the bank in 2015-2016. The loan was restructured in 2016. The whole cost of the project was estimated by business publications to range between US$650 million and US$1 billion.
caption: Wireframe version of the tower
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