The Shard

The glass spire above London Bridge station. It is 309.6 metres (1,016 feet) tall, with 95 storeys.^[1]

By George Morina. Last checked 24 Oct 2026 against the sources listed at the bottom of this page.

A “vertical city”

The architect Renzo Piano and the developer Irvine Sellar planned it as a mixed-use building: offices from level 2 to 28, restaurants on 31 to 33, a hotel on 34 to 52, homes on 53 to 65, and a public viewing gallery above.^[1] Piano has said the site, on top of a major transport hub, showed you could bring life to a city without adding traffic, because people arrive by public transport.^[1]

The viewing galleries

The View from The Shard is on levels 68 to 72, about 244 metres up. It opened in February 2013, and the building says that on a clear day you can see about 40 miles (64 km).^[1] It's ticketed: see the official site for times and prices.^[2]

A few numbers

• About 11,000 glass panels cover the outside.^[1]
• The building has 36 lifts, some of them double-decker.^[1]
• At the busiest point, 1,450 workers from 60 countries were building it.^[1]
• Near the end of construction, a fox was found on the 72nd floor. Staff named him Romeo.^[1]

If you'd rather not pay for a view, see free things to do.