STANDING prominently in the heart of the Central business district, the Bank of China tower appears as a magnificent symbol of China's growing influence in Hong Kong.
Its architect, the renowned American Chinese Pei Ieoh-ming knew the bank's owners - the Chinese government - wanted to make a statement with their new building, stressing the bank's importance to Hong Kong and the rest of the financial world.
Seventy storeys and 316 metres later, the tower has become a landmark in the business district and, its height, the yard-stick for all competing structures.
As well as designing the bank's most prominent building, Mr Pei has other historic links with the group.
His father, Pei Tsu-yie, was the first Hong Kong manager of the bank during the Nationalist period.
Mr Pei's company said the tower design was based on classical Chinese philosophy: the structure was like ''the trunk of the bamboo propelled ever higher by each new growth''.
