Okhta Centre (Gazprom)

St Petersburg

Lerch Bates Limited has been commissioned to design the vertical transportation and façade access systems for the Gazprom Headquarters Tower in the newly planned Okhta Centre, St. Petersburg, Russia.  Designed by Architects RMJM the project consists of one 396m corporate headquarters tower and four other smaller towers above ground. The twisting glass tower will change colour up to 10 times per day, depending on the position of the sun.

The tower has been designed with the most efficient use of stacking from an “elevatoring” viewpoint with the most densely occupied activities at the lowest floors and the least densely occupied floors at the top. This “stacking” arrangement leads to the minimum possible number of lifts relative to stacking alternatives with the largest populations at the base of the tower. The lower floors of the tower also have the largest floor plates which is also advantageous. The design work on the lift system includes low rise, mid rise and high speed express lifts to the Sky lobby, lower high rise and upper high rise. In addition to the offices, there are a couple of observation decks on the top of the tower served by a bank of high speed lifts.