Abstract
Over the past 30 years, the tall building has seen unprecedented global support. With advanced innovation and many regions around the world discovering increasing growth rates, the tall, supertall, and megatall buildings continue to drastically alter the vertical urbanism of the cities they inhabit. For centuries, urban conditions in most major territories were predominately defined by the street wall and the spaces it shapes. Giambattista Nolli's 1748 Map of Rome most clearly illustrates this significance and possibly solidifies what generations would understand to be the predominant urban condition. As architects, it has been a city's lower vertical wall fabric that has often been the primary focus of efforts to craft an urban experience, and for good reason. Through recent examples of built and unbuilt KPF projects, this paper will explore an upper vertical wall fabric, an urbanism that not only exists at the ground but also within the troposphere.