Editor’s Note
This article highlights the recent shift in architectural scale, with India’s Surat Diamond Bourse now holding the title of the world’s largest office building. Its immense size reflects the region’s pivotal role in the global diamond trade.
Since last year, the world’s largest office building is no longer in the USA, but in India. The new diamond exchange in Surat is a building of superlatives.
4,700 offices and a total area of 650,000 square meters. The Surat Diamond Bourse, newly opened in the autumn of last year, has dethroned the Pentagon in the USA as the world’s largest office building after many decades. The head of the diamond exchange, Mahesh Gadhavi, emphasizes that this was not the intention. Rather, the construction of the building was simply based on demand.
65,000 employees are expected to work in the gigantic complex, which consists of nine double cubes with 15 floors each. The number of elevators alone gives an indication of the epic dimensions of the structure: there are 131 in total. In addition to the thousands of workrooms and various conference rooms, the building also includes restaurants, shopping facilities, wellness areas, and nine irrigated inner courtyards for cooling. The average temperature in Surat is 27 degrees Celsius. According to information from the news portal CNN, the construction is said to have cost 350 million euros. It was designed by the Indian architecture firm Morphogenesis.
The main focus is on cutting and trading diamonds. 90 percent of all diamonds worldwide are cut in Surat. In total, there are around 4,000 diamond cutting workshops in the western Indian city of millions. Estimates suggest that 1.5 million people in Surat are directly or indirectly involved in the diamond value chain. Therefore, Surat is also called “Diamond City” by many. Rough diamonds worth billions are traded there every month. For Surat, diamonds are the number one prosperity factor, and the new exchange is now intended to keep employees in the sector in the city. Until now, many had to commute to Mumbai.
Even in the 1960s, diamonds were mainly cut in Antwerp or Tel Aviv. However, after the Indian government approved the import and export of diamonds, more and more diamonds found their way to Surat. To this day, low wages attract the industry – and now perhaps also the world’s largest office building. In any case, it makes the diamond city sparkle even more.