Vancouver developer targets world’s wealthy with his ‘52-storey sculpture’

Canadian developer Ian Gillespie was in full spate as he described his vision for Vancouver as an Asia-Pacific hub, attracting the best and brightest to what is routinely ranked as one of the world's most liveable cities.

It is a vision that underpins his latest project: Vancouver House, a futuristic-looking high-rise that Gillespie predicted would become a landmark for the city when completed in 2018.

The luxury residential tower is being marketed around the world, including Beijing, Shanghai and Hong Kong, where Gillespie and Danish architect Bjarke Ingels are due to officially unveil the project today.

Yet in a recent interview in his Vancouver office, Gillespie admitted his home city was experiencing "growing pains" after a decade in which more than 40,000 rich immigrants, 80 per cent of them Chinese, moved to the city under a recently axed millionaire migration scheme.

In addition to being one of the world's most liveable cities, Vancouver is now the second-most unaffordable housing market in the world behind Hong Kong, according to the Demographia* consultancy's study of 378 cities around the world in nine markets.

With prices of detached homes now averaging more than C$1.2 million (HK$8.6 million), can Vancouverites afford any more internationalisation?