Characteristics of Iconic High-rise Buildings

Iconography is a degree given to a building and an objective of its architectural design. The iconic high-rise buildings are important in various fields. Distinctiveness in skyscrapers is not achieved by chance or by exciting stories told about the building. Exaggeration in one of design elements does not achieve the uniqueness and architectural creativity. Iconicity is a product of gathering specific main cores. The iconic tall buildings have distinct characteristics that set them different from other buildings. This paper proposes to combine the distinctive characteristics of the iconic high-rise buildings from different references to form a unified and clear methodology used when designing to achieve the iconicity. The developed methodology can be relied upon in the critical analysis of those skyscrapers to determine the degree of iconicity, and to know the reasons for the failure of some tall buildings in achieving the iconicity with a simple and systematic methodology.