Antilia Tower is the home of the Indian billionaire Mukesh Ambani and his family. When you factor in the cost of both the land and the construction, this is the most expensive personally owned residence in the world (Buckingham Palace has a higher value, but it is property of the Crown).
Antilia is 27 stories high, but those stories are extra-high, so it’s height is representative of a 60 story building. The Ambani’s have a staff of over 600 people at the residence to service the 5 full time residents and 49,000 square feet. Each story is completely different from all others by design. There is a “Snow room” that has equipment spitting out artificial snow so that the Ambani’s and their guests can build snowmen in the 40°C+ temperatures of Mumbai.
By A.Savin (Wikimedia Commons ยท WikiPhotoSpace) –
The building is the subject of many, many controversies. Among them include:
- The building is seen as an example of the vast rift between the rich and poor in Indian Society. Ratan Tata, the former chairman of The Tata Group, reportedly said about Antilia, “It makes me wonder why someone would do that. That’s what revolutions are made of.”
- The land was previously deeded as a waqf to an orphanage. Transferring the land should not have been legal, and the price paid was slightly more than 10% of it’s prevailing market value. The land issue seems to have gone away based on several additional payments to various government organizations.
- The Indian Navy has a standing restriction on helipads in that area of Mumbai. The buildings 3 helipads have also been the source of various noise complaints.
- The building’s car park has numerous licensing and potentially structural issues
Those who found this architectural nightmare before the hint:
- Paul Voestermans
- Lighthouse
- Eloy Cano
- Phil Ower
- Ashwini Agrawal
- Garfield
- hhgygy
- Steve Hoge
- Glenmorren
- Ann K.
And those who stayed behind sharpening the pitchforks and wrapping the torches until the hint:
- Maureen
- Chris Nason