New aerial photographs show a September 11 memorial at New York's Ground Zero is finally taking shape.

The photos show one of two pools being built over the footprints of the former Twin Towers.

The pools will echo the voids left when the towers collapsed (see video of the memorial plans below).

So far a steel structure has been built at street level, showing where the water will cascade from the sides into the centre.

The memorial and an underground museum are expected to be completed by construction manager Bovis Lend Lease by 2012.

Construction at Ground Zero has been dogged by cost blow-outs and wrangling since 2001 - particularly on the Freedom Tower project. However, work is proceeding and construction of the tower is now visible above ground.

For updates on plans and progress at the memorial site go here.

Sick of loud neighbours and stupid rules? Just want a piece of the world to call your own?

Well, a mob called the Seasteading Institute claims every wanna-be dictator can get their hands on their own floating country*.

Offshore oil rig designer Marine Innovation and Technology has developed a 15,000 sq m deck held together by carbon-fibre cables for aspiring rulers to build upon.

Stabilising pillars minimise the effects of big waves and an auxiliary diesel generator provides power. It even includes a desalination plant.

The Seasteading Institute advocates the colonisation of the high seas to tackle house prices and rising sea levels. It also claims seasteads can be built anywhere and towed into place.

For a cool £35m hopeful monarchs can retire to one of these private little continents and live out their days in a land where bad mullets and plumber's crack are banned.

*Actual law-making abilities may cost extra.

Here is a skyscraper to interest the shoe-aholics of the world - Dorobani Tower in Bucharest, Romania.

Designed by Zaha Hadid Architects, this 200m skyscraper will not only feature 35,000 sq m of luxury hotel stuff such as restaurants and spas, but also 4,600 sq m of shoe shopping space on its lower levels.

True shoe fetishists can even fork out for one of the apartments making up another 35,000 sq m of the building, because when you love something you just want to be near it.

Plans show an oblique diamond shaped tower that bulges in the middle and a patterned, mesh-like facade that changes at various levels. Behind some glazed areas are curved balconies, adding even more detail to the striking skyscraper.

Construction work was supposed to start in 2008 and be finished by 2013, but the tower is yet to be approved.

In a little Las Vegas neighbourhood - once home to Mike Tyson and the Sultan of Brunei - Microsoft has been developing the world's most technologically-advanced home.

The New American Home (more pics here) on the outskirts of Vegas showcases builders' best practices, aesthetics and technological know-how to demonstrate how great performance can be built into any home.

The massive home supposedly costs nothing to run thanks to photovoltaics, clever site orientation, insulated concrete walls and a gas-powered mechanical HVAC system.

And if that isn't enough, it is filled with gadgets including 10 HDTVs and the kinds of bells and whistles that let you to turn on the tub and fire up the home stereo from a mobile phone.

But this home isn't all brains and no beauty - it also features a striking pool that is the same level as the surrounding edge - just separated by a tiny drain.

Of course Microsoft wasn't the only company to work on the home's design - for a full list try here.

The home is sponsored by America's National Council of the Housing Industry and other major home building organisations and comes with an approximate price tag of US$5m.

Around 14 will be built in the Marquis Vegas area. The one pictured will be retained in at least the short-term as a display home / educational tool / product showcase.

Australia's banana-benders have been left scratching their heads at a 1980s technology that has slightly transformed the look of a Brisbane skyscraper.

Locals in the Queensland city are stumped at how and why the usually triangular Central Plaza One tower has suddenly sprouted a long, horizontal beam from its' top.

Designed by Kisho Kurokawa and completed in 1988, the skyscraper features a maintenance system that was state-of-the-art back when we all listened to cassettes.

This maintenance system is built into the tower's roof and is concealed behind inconspicuous doors. Four times a year these doors open and a horizontal crane arm - capable of rotating 360 degrees - extends from within.

This arm controls a large cage that moves around the building to clean it.

Good to see a piece of 1980s technology still impressing the locals.

When designing the largest skyscraper to be built in the American city of Cincinnati, where would you go for inspiration?

Particularly if the tower was to be named the Great American Tower?

Would you channel a bit of Jackie O - America's own piece of royalty, or perhaps Aretha Franklin the Queen of Soul?

Well HOK's Gyo Obata went abroad, taking inspiration from the very un-American, Norfolk-born, British Princess Diana.

Gyo was flipping through books when he came upon a picture of Diana wearing a crown.

"That's perfect. Here we have the crown of the building, and the nickname for the city is Queen City," Joe Robertson of HOK reportedly said when Gyo came to him with the idea.

The Great American Tower will rise to 41-storeys and will be crowned with its' own version of Diana's tiara.

Construction, led by Turner Construction Company, started on the weekend and will be completed in 2011.

Burj Dubai - the tallest building in the world - has hit topping out stage.

At least that is the rumour setting the internet ablaze at the moment - an official announcement has yet to be made.

Witnesses in Dubai say the tower has hit well over 800m and will not be going any higher and Wiki claims topping out was achieved 17 January.

Local media reports the skyscraper is being prepped for an 09/09/09 soft opening.

What we do know for sure is that workers are adding an antenna with a blinking light to the tower.

Samsung Engineering and Construction has confirmed its' workers are on the job.

Architecture's It-girl of the moment Zaha Hadid has won a competition to give a former fire station in Antwerp a new lease on life.

Located on the boundary of Antwerp and its' harbour, the classic fire station will be given a new reflective addition - separating the structure into two distinct halves.

The 46m high addition juts out and above the old building and is made of glass triangles, some reflective and some transparent.

These triangles are slightly rotated, which reflects the incoming light and apparently pays tribute to Antwerp's diamond history.

The massive extension will be supported by three sculptured concrete pillars, which also house the lifts and stairs (for a full description go here).

Zaha Hadid explains: "The dichotomy between the reflective, faceted form of the new extension and the powerful structural mass of the existing fire station creates a bold and enigmatic statement for the city."

And she is sure right - but with such a daring juxtaposition of old and new, it will definitely to raise a few eyebrows in Antwerp.

Construction is expected to be completed in 2013.

Keen to cement itself as the 'lifestyle' centre of Asia, Singapore has added a new skyscraper to its' skyline (video here).

The Sail @ Marina Bay is a 245m high, 70-storey mixed-use tower with 1,111 luxury apartments that broke real estate records when they hit the market a few years back.

Late Ryanair jazillionaire Tony Ryan's sons Cathal and Declan were rumoured to have forked out around £5m to purchase all 11 apartments on the tower's 16th floor.

Construction is due to finish shortly, so whoever the lucky tenants are they had better start packing.

The tower is being built by Bouygues subsidiary Dragages for City Developments and AIG Global Real Estate and has been a challenge due to its' location on unstable soil and above a subway line.

Designed by NBBJ Architects, the smooth skyscraper was inspired by sun, wind and water.

Work on what would have been the world's tallest building, standing more than 1km high, has been put on ice for at least a year.

In a move that suggests the property bubble has finally popped in Dubai, government-owned developer Nakheel said it was halting "further work" on the building's foundations.

It is not known just how much work has already been completed.

"This is part of our readjustment of our immediate business plans to better reflect the current market trends and match supply with demand," Nakheel said in a statement.

It is a bitter blow for the firm, which has also downed tools on the Trump Tower and International Hotel in December and delayed work on projects including Frond N villas, Gateway Towers and schemes at the Waterfront and the Palm Jebel Ali.

The New York Times says the world's hottest property market - Dubai - has gone cold and that this could be the beginning of a big property slide in the emirate.

In reality though, the curse of the skyscraper index strikes again!

The lucrative future of wind farm construction around the world could be over after aliens allegedly attacked a turbine in England.

Locals in Conisholme, Lincolnshire woke on the weekend to find to find one of their beloved tubines massacred.

And with not much evidence to go on, they went straight for the aliens.

Locals reported seeing "glowing spheres" in the sky at about the same time as the turbine died and are convinced it was either ET or a mystery airplane.

The manufacturer says the turbine was built to withstand extreme weather.

But obviously it wasn't built to withstand the full force of aliens on a mission to destroy renewable energy in the UK, if not the world.

Today, wind turbines, tommorrow, Al Gore.

Bored with Bristol? Done with Dublin? Over Oslo? Then why not try a move to the moon?

With NASA wanting to create a permanent base on the moon (the commute is pure hell), a group of American students are trying to build a dome made of moon-rock bricks.

The Virginia Tech students, who like to call themselves the Masons of Regolith, are using a kind of volcanic ash to make the lunar bricks that they hope one day will be made on the lunar surface.

The process is pretty high-tech (find out more here) but calls on old-fashioned and ancient building practices to overcome the quirks of building on another planet.

Because mortar would be pretty hard to use on the moon, the students have decided to build a dome that supports its own weight.

They're doing really well, but still have a few hurdles to clear.

The process used to fire the bricks hasn't been tested in a vacuum and the domes aren't quite airtight (though they could shield astronauts from debris and radiation).

Experiments are proceeding and the university's next batch of students will be given orders to stop with the brick-making and start with the dome-building.

Hopefully that means builders could be space-bound in a few decades.

Shopaholics know the advice well - if you really, really like it, why not get two?

Well it seems officials in Canada's wild west city of Calgary have done just that - ordering a second building to mimic one planned in the city's south-west.

Construction work has started on Eighth Avenue Place between 8th and 9th Avenues and 4th and 5th streets.

The precinct will feature a 183m west tower and 202m east tower, with building work starting on the east tower first. A start date has not been set for the west tower.

Apparently just one tower was planned at first, but was increased to two because of the popularity of the design by Gibbs Gage Architects and Pickard Chiltern.

The towers are themed around the Rocky Moutains, with the western facing facade to be pale green glass in tribute to mountain waters and glaciers. The rest of the building will be grey and layered to represent the tectonic plates that formed the mountains.

The view would be pretty great too.

Bullet train firm Kintetsu Group has unveiled plans to build Japan's tallest tower in bustling Osaka.

The bullet train operator has engaged Cesar Pelli to design a stepped 300m concrete and glass tower with 210,000 sq m of internal space.

It will have all the usual features, including a hotel, a massive department store to whet the appetites of Japan's shopaholics and terraced sky gardens for workers.

Named the Abenobashi Terminal Building Tower, it is planned for Abeno-ku in Osaka.

If approved, it is expected to be completed in 2014.

An entire military airbase will be reshuffled in South Korea and its' runway moved to allow developers to build a 555m skyscraper.

Developer Lotte Group is celebrating after winning a 15-year battle to convince the government to approve the tower, which is proposed just 9.2km from the Seongnam Airbase in southern Seoul.

The skyscraper was almost abandoned when officials realised its height and location posed a serious flight risk.

But not to let the threat of death get in the way, Lotte Group has managed to sort out a deal that will see the eastern runway moved three degrees to the west and flight safety equipment upgraded.

The skyscraper will be built as part of the developer's Lotte World II mixed-use project in Jamsil.

The government believes the runway relocation will cost about £51.3m - and Lotte will have to foot the bill.

"We will cooperate with the Air Force to come up with flight safety measures at our expense," the Lotte Group said.

Finances still have to be sorted out but it is good news for other developers in the area, as Lotte's 15-year battle is likely to see height restrictions in the area lifted.

A Ground Zero construction boss has been charged with stealing more than US$1m by filing fake invoices and using the cash for luxury holidays and cars.

Robert Chiarappa is alleged to have filed false invoices for US$1.2m in materials that were never delivered to the Deutsche Bank building where he worked.

He is also accused of taking kickbacks including clothes, cars, holidays and cash.

Chiarappa was employed by the John Galt Corporation on the former New York Deutsche Bank building damaged in the September 11 terrorist attacks.

He is alleged to have shared the payments issued by the government agency responsible for the building's dismantling, with vendors.

But the gravy train came to an end when Chiarappa and Galt were kicked off the job after two firefighters were killed battling a blaze in the building in 2007.

John Galt Corp and three other officials were indicted last month on manslaughter charges related to the fire.

New York commissioner of investigation Rose Gill Hearn said Galt provided a double whammy.

"With the selection of Galt for this complex deconstruction project, the public got an unsafe work site and had its pocket picked," the New York Times reported her as saying.

Galt deny knowing anything about the supposed scam.

New York's iconic Empire State Building could have a tall friend to gaze across at, with plans afoot to build a skyscraper near the giant.

Vornado Realty Trust has filed an application to rezone the site of the historic Hotel Pennsylvania on 7th Ave and 33rd St to make way for a tower up to 380m high.

Vornado filed "scoping documents" but has not offically requested the seven month rezoning process begin yet.

The firm is rumoured to be contemplating demolition of the hotel to build the 180,000 sq m tower, which wouldn't be far from the Empire State.

The proposal is likely to gather a lot of reaction as the area around the Empire State Building is protected so that other skyscrapers don't devalue the building's impact on the city skyline.

Construction of the rather simple, concave tower could start in 2010 and be completed by 2014.

The collapse of a subway under construction in China has forced the evacuation of dozens of residents after their six-storey building started tilting.

The residents in Guangzhou were forced to flee their homes when the ground above the subway construction site collapsed on Sunday.

The building now has a lean of a neat 2 degrees and might have to be rebuilt.

"If the experts identify the tilted building as dangerous, we will demolish it and build a new one for the residents," Feng Guoguan, construction site boss, told the China Daily.

"If a new building is not possible, we will erect the old one using the latest technologies."

It seems these subway cave-ins are worringly normal in Guangzhou, which has an apparently complicated and fragile geology made worse by underground construction.

After a kind of lousy 2008, Donald Trump has welcomed the new year with a bang - or really with a spire, to be more specific.

The hair-challenged developer finally topped out the 360m Trump International Hotel and Tower in Chicago with a spire that now takes the building's height to an impressive 415m (see video below).

The building can now lay claim to being the second tallest in the United States after the Sears Tower, which is also located in Chicago.

Workers battled chilly temperatures and strong winds to install the spire, according to this eyewitness report.

"That's the amazing thing--that [the ironworkers] had the dexterity to put the bolts in at that temperature," structural engineer Dane Rankin told the Chicago Tribune.

Efforts to install the spire last month were foiled by high winds. As a result construction workers removed much of the spire's fibreglass covering.

In the next few weeks they'll be up there again reinstalling the gray-tinted fibreglass around the steel.

With the 609m Chicago Spire skyscraper on hold during the recession, who knows how soon we'll see another of these mega-tall topping outs in the States?

There were a lot of wacky buildings that didn't make the grade in 2008, but the rejection of this observation tower in Vancouver is particularly tragic.

The 60m tower was proposed for Queen Elizabeth Park in the western Canadian city but was rejected following public outcry.

Developers said it would restore the park's famous 360 degree views of Vancouver, which had been blocked by trees.

Instead they cut the trees down.

Locals pretty much hated the tower from the get-go even though it looked like something from the Jetsons, which - in case you don't know - was one of the best TV shows ever.

Maybe in the future when we all live in groovy Skypad apartments and can fold our cars up into a suitcase we'll get a Jetsons tower.