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The party capital of the Costa Blanca, already famous for having more skyscrapers per person than anywhere else on earth, is now preparing to claim another impressive title: home to the tallest residential building in the entire European Union.

 

Developer TM Grupo Inmobiliario has completed the ground floor slab of Benidorm’s TM Tower, a colossal new skyscraper that will soar 230 metres into the sky and stretch across 64 floors once finished.

 

That will make it significantly taller than Warsaw’s famous Złota 44 tower, which currently holds the EU residential crown but comes in 38 metres shorter and 12 floors smaller.

 

And while the tower is still rising from the ground, wealthy buyers are already piling in.

 

According to TM Grupo Inmobiliario, half of the 260 luxury homes have already been reserved, with buyers paying an average of €974,607 per property. The strongest demand so far has come from Poland, Spain and Ukraine.

 

The sheer scale of the project is staggering even by Benidorm standards, which has never been known to do things by halves.

 

The foundations alone required 355 piles driven up to 16 metres deep, along with 3,588 linear metres of drilling, more than 5,300 cubic metres of concrete and 245 tonnes of steel. The structure is designed to support a jaw dropping 85,000 tonnes, which the developer says is equivalent to eight and a half Eiffel Towers or 200 wide body aircraft.

 

The company has reportedly invested close to €2 million in this phase alone.

 

Once complete, the skyscraper will feature more than 10,000 square metres of communal areas including heated pools, wellness spaces, sports facilities, a cinema room and perhaps most impressively of all, a panoramic sky bar and astronomical observatory on the 63rd floor.

 

The design itself is inspired by the organic shape of marine coral, although critics will no doubt simply see another giant tower looming over the Mediterranean coast.

 

Still, giant towers are exactly what Benidorm does best.

 

The city already boasts more skyscrapers per capita than New York, Dubai, Hong Kong or Tokyo. Despite having a population of just over 77,000 people, Benidorm has more than 60 buildings exceeding 25 storeys, at least 65 towers taller than 80 metres and 26 buildings topping 100 metres.

 

That works out at roughly one skyscraper over 100 metres for every 2,970 residents, a ratio unmatched anywhere else on the planet.

 

Benidorm’s unusual obsession with building upwards dates back decades and was originally driven by tourism, limited coastal land and an urban planning model that encouraged vertical expansion rather than endless urban sprawl.

 

Now, with TM Tower preparing to dominate the skyline, the city seems determined to push that identity even further.

 

Images: TM Tower