Nonda Katsalidis was born in Athens in 1951 and migrated to Melbourne, Australia, at the age of five. He studied architecture at the University of Melbourne and graduated in 1976. Katsalidis is mainly known for being the architect of Melbourne’s tallest building, Eureka Tower.
Katsalidis’ architecture firm, Fender Katsalidis Architects (FKA) in partnership with Karl Fender, gained approval in March to construct Australia 108, a super-tall skyscraper located in the Southbank precinct of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.
When built, the building will be 388 meters (1,273 ft) high and comprise 108 stories. Upon completion, it will be the tallest building in Australia, surpassing the Gold Coast’s Q1 and Melbourne’s Eureka Tower, and be the tallest building in the Southern Hemisphere.
But even more impressing that its height will be the building’s innovative way of construction, which opens new paths in the construction of multi-story buildings, not only in Australia but worldwide. Already Asians and Europeans seek for Katsalidis cooperation.
The difference in Katsalidis’ designing is that the rooms whether they are apartments or hotel rooms will be constructed indoors. The rooms will be prefabricated in a factory and transferred with a huge track to the place where the skyscraper is going to be built.
According to Katsalidis, this method of construction saves a lot of money and time. “The workers by going up and down the scaffolding lose two of the eight work hours. In addition they won’t have to be afraid about the weather, as the construction will take place indoors. It will be safer for them, as they will spend most of their time on earth and not in the air”.
Such constructions have already been completed in the past, with the basic difference that in that cases only stereotypical boxes were made, while in Katsalidis case will be no limit in the design.
One of his professors, Professor Leon van Schalk describes Katsalidis’s unique ability to combine his love for the materials with the inspiration for big plans and innovative and challenging ideas which include the economic factor, given that he is himself an investor of those who do not hesitate to take risks.
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