Above-ground work on the world's first one-kilometre tall tower will start next month in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, a report said.

Construction on the Kingdom Tower will begin on April 27, said the report in the UK-based Building. Construction is scheduled to complete in 63 months.

The construction of the $1.2bn skyscraper will be overseen by joint UK project managers EC Harris and Mace, it said.

Kingdom Tower will be the centrepiece and first phase of the  $20bn Kingdom City, a mixed-use district to the north of Jeddah.

The developer, Jeddah Economic Company, has not yet confirmed the exact height of the tower, but has indicated it will be over 1km tall. The current tallest tower in the world is the 828m-tall Burj Khalifa in Dubai.

The piling work on the project was completed in December by contractor Saudi Bauer, said the report

The project’s architect is US-based Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill Architecture and the main contractor Saudi Binladin Group.