An elephant without a home

Warsaw now has its very own candidate for a white elephant that could serve as an example in future dictionary entries. When the announcement was made in March by the new management of Orco that the developer’s Złota residential project in Warsaw had been a financial disaster and that they intended sell it in its unfinished state asap, it came as little surprise. The distinctive 192m, 54-storey sail-shaped tower, the highest residential building in the EU, was planned in the middle of the last decade at the euphoric height of the boom and designed by an architect of world-renown, Daniel Libeskind. The idea was to develop high-end luxury flats in a prestigious building located in the epicentre of Warsaw – a city hitherto lacking in such properties. Obviously, it must have seemed like a good idea at the time. However, no sooner had the project been launched than the problems started to multiply. It was plagued for several years by permitting issues and objections from reside