After a 45-story office tower in Caracas, Venezuela was abandoned before its completion in 1994, residents in the area moved into the building in 2008, turning it into a “vertical slum” that hosted more than 750 families.
Photographer Iwan Baan explored ‘The Tower of David’, the world’s tallest slum, and captured the daily lives of its residents that converted the building into living areas filled with amenities like gyms, hair salons, and shops.
His photos were compiled into a photo book, Torre David: Informal Vertical Communities, written in 2012 by directors Alfredo Brillembourg and Hubert Klumpner from design practice, Urban-Think Tank.
However, it seems like the photo book is all that is left of the slum, as plans to relocate the residents were announced last July.
Take a look at a selection of photos from the book, which is available for purchase here.
[via Fast Co. Design, Images by Iwan Baan via Fast Co. Design and Lars Müller Publishers]