Location
The bank is based in Frankfurt, the largest financial centre in the Eurozone. Its location in the city is fixed by the Amsterdam Treaty along with other major institutions. In the city, the bank currently occupies Frankfurt's Eurotower until its purpose-built headquarters are built.
In 1999 an international architectural competition was launched by the bank to design a new building. It was won by a Vienna-based architectural office named Coop Himmelbau. The building will be approximately 180 metres (591 ft) tall (the present building is 148 m/486 ft high.) and will be accompanied with other secondary buildings on a landscaped site on the site of the former wholesale market in the eastern part of Frankfurt am Main. The main construction began in October 2008, with completion scheduled during 2014. It is expected that the building will become an architectural symbol for Europe and is designed to accommodate double the number of staff who operate in the Eurotower.
Read more about this topic: European Central Bank