After the Walkie Talkie, here is a trio of Trimphones: New York-based architect Daniel Libeskind has unveiled designs for three towers to be built near the new AS Roma football stadium, with the tallest reaching 220 metres in height (+ slideshow).
The office towers, each with a different profile designed to make it look like they're "in conversation with one another", are planned for a site in Rome's Tor di Valle business district, in the south of the Italian city.
Resembling from certain angles the handset of the Trimphone - a fixed-line telephone introduced in the UK in the 1960s - Libeskind's glass-clad skyscrapers will vary in height, and each sit on a three-storey podium with a planted green roof.
Each of the towers has an angular form. According to the architect, this intention is to make it seem as if the three shapes have been sliced out from a single block.
"The volumes fit into each other like antique building blocks creating a composition of elements that are both connected and singular," said a statement from Studio Libeskind.
They will all feature one or two atrium-like garden areas, with huge windows of faceted or folded glass providing views of the city.
"The towers are clad in a web of opaque panels that breaks up the glazed facade and creates a unified aesthetic between the trio," said the architect's firm. "Tower One forms the centrepiece of the composition, featuring two vertical gardens on opposite sides, one on the lower half and the other on the upper floors."
A 3,000-square-metre public piazza will surround the base, and the scheme will be connected to the stadium by a wide shopping street.
The 287,000-square-metre business park, masterplanned by Libeskind and American architect Dan Meis, is part of a wider redevelopment of the 100-hectare site that was formerly home to the city's hippodrome. The project includes Meis' 52,500-seat AS Roma football stadium, which is conceived as a "modern colosseum".
It is one of a number of areas around the edges of the historic city that have been undergoing redevelopment. Zaha Hadid's controversial MAXXI museum, on Via Guido Reni in the north of the city, sits in another of these areas.
"Making an architectural contribution to the Eternal City is a treasured opportunity," said Daniel Libeskind. "Rome will have a world-class business park connected to the stadium that will provide a vibrant, sustainable, neighbourhood in this ancient city."
