The US’ Landtech Design has been awarded a contract to design elements of the landscaping around the Kingdom Tower project in Jeddah.

The US firm has been appointed to provide consultancy services on the landscape irrigation design for the 1-kilometre-high Kingdom Tower, which will be the world’s tallest tower when completed.

The Kingdom tower will be almost 200 metres taller than Emaar’s 828m Burj Khalifa in Dubai, and will contain hotels, offices, residential apartments and a shopping centre. In August last year, the local Saudi Binladin Group was awarded an estimated SR4.6bn ($1.2bn) contract to build the tower.

The kingdom tower and surrounding area is being developed by the Jeddah Economic Company, which was formed in 2009 with a consortium of the local Kingdom Holding, Abraar International Holding Company, Quilla’a Jeddah Company and the local Saudi Binladen Group. The first phase of the development will cover a total area of 1.4 million square metres of land, which will include a number of residential, business and retail facilities.