This book examines vertical urbanism in the context of Hong Kong's environmental design practice and its related historical context and regulatory environment. It raises questions about the assumptions and foundations in planning practices in the West, where there is an abnormal absence of a formal theory for planning in the vertical dimension. Three interconnected factors underlying the urban scene of Hong Kong are discussed: market logic, planning policy, and a culture of proximity. The motive of this book is to define the institutional characteristics of the general East Asian urban form, including collective consumption, alternative building paradigms, market oriented land policy, spatial operation of interiorized public life and entrepreneurial-governmental unification in civic developments.