NEC Supertower

Completed in January 1990, the 43-storey, 180-metre headquarters of NEC Corporation features a striking mid-rise void — approximately 42 metres wide and 15 metres tall — designed to channel wind through the building and reduce turbulence at street level.

Use

Office tower

Area

Minato City

Completed

1990

Floors

43 above ground, 4 below

Height

180 m

Developer

NEC Corporation

Architect

Nikken Sekkei

A Supertower with a Void at Its Core

The NEC Headquarters Building — known by its official sobriquet, the NEC Supertower — was completed in January 1990 at 5-7-1 Shiba, Minato City, Tokyo. Rising 43 floors above ground and four below, with a height of 180 metres, the building was designed by Nikken Sekkei as part of what the firm described as its “third-generation” high-rise concept, in which environmental performance and structural innovation are treated as inseparable. Both Mita Station on the Toei Mita and Asakusa Lines and Tamachi Station on the JR Yamanote and Keihin-Tohoku Lines are within walking distance of the site. The tower’s completion in early 1990 placed it squarely at the height of Japan’s economic boom, a period when major corporations were building headquarters on an ambitious scale.

The building’s defining feature is a large opening in its mid-section: a void approximately 42 metres wide and 15 metres high piercing the structure above the twelfth floor. Designed to address the street-level wind turbulence that tall buildings generate, the opening channels prevailing winds upward rather than allowing them to amplify at ground level. Above the void, the tower’s cross-section narrows significantly, giving the structure a rocket-like profile that is visible from Tamachi and the Shibaura waterfront — earning it the informal nickname “Rocket Building.” The structural engineering required to achieve a span of this size made the opening as much a feat of construction as a work of architecture.

Shiba and the Slow Transformation of Minato City’s Southern Flank

The Shiba 5-chome address places the NEC Supertower close to Zojoji Temple and Shiba Park. When the tower was completed in 1990, it dramatically reshaped the skyline east of Tamachi Station, standing as a solitary landmark in a district that was still in transition. In the three decades since, large-scale redevelopment has steadily altered the Tamachi and Shibaura waterfronts, filling in the skyline around it. Yet the NEC Supertower retains its presence on the southern edge of Minato City’s skyline, its narrowing silhouette remaining distinct even as the surrounding urban fabric has grown denser.

Summary

The NEC Supertower was completed in January 1990 with 43 above-ground floors and a height of 180 metres, designed by Nikken Sekkei for NEC Corporation at 5-7-1 Shiba, Minato City. The mid-rise void — 42 metres wide, 15 metres tall — stands as both a wind-engineering solution and an architectural gesture that makes the building immediately recognisable from a distance. Walk from Tamachi or Mita Station toward Shiba, look upward, and the tower’s narrowing form against the sky illustrates clearly how a structural challenge can become a building’s defining identity.

Related: WTC Tokyo South Tower / Tokyo Portcity Takeshiba

Looking for a hotel near Mita or Tamachi? Rakuten Travel covers hotels across central Tokyo.