Mega Builds
Ten Colossal Construction Projects That Will Change Our World
Published on 21. May 2026
Book
Hardback
320 pages
978-0-7535-6161-4 (ISBN)
Description
Discover the incredible, fact-packed new book shining a light on the world's biggest engineering challenges, and what they tell us about our future.
THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER
A NEW SCIENTIST BEST NEW POPULAR SCIENCE BOOK OF 2026
'A ceaselessly uplifting and positive book.' - Mark Cooper-Jones, author of This Way Up by the Map Men
'Reveals the feats shaping the 21st century.' - Chris Broad, bestselling author of Abroad in Japan
---
Modern engineering is rewriting the rulebook and revolutionising how we live.
In Mega Builds, Fred Mills - the founder of global construction platform The B1M - takes you inside ten of the most extraordinary engineering projects that are reshaping our modern world.
From a 170km-long smart city in Saudi Arabia, to Japan's levitating railway and France's bold quest for limitless energy, Mills delivers an eye-opening tour of the biggest engineering challenges set to change the world as we know it.
By the end of this book, you'll learn:
Why the world's biggest city has been built in the worst place imaginable.
Where the vision of a single ruler in the desert is rewriting our understanding of what's possible.
What drives us to build ever-higher buildings and design ever-faster trains.
And above all, how the dizzying scale of human imagination will inform the future of the man-made world.
Written in Fred's signature accessible style, Mega Builds demystifies the complexities while exploring the economic, environmental and societal stakes of building at unprecedented scale.
The trajectory of our civilisation is being authored today all around us, not in words on a page, but in steel and concrete.
Meet the projects and people set to transform our very experience of life on earth.
Praise for Mega Builds:
'A fascinating exploration of the world's biggest and boldest construction projects.' - Sadiq Khan, Mayor of London
'Fred has a gift for turning megaprojects into stories you can feel.' - Grady Hillhouse, author of Engineering in Plain Sight and creator of Practical Engineering
'Superb... Mills rightly celebrates how thinking big is often the right answer.' - Christian Wolmar, author of British Rail and The Rise of the Railway
THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER
A NEW SCIENTIST BEST NEW POPULAR SCIENCE BOOK OF 2026
'A ceaselessly uplifting and positive book.' - Mark Cooper-Jones, author of This Way Up by the Map Men
'Reveals the feats shaping the 21st century.' - Chris Broad, bestselling author of Abroad in Japan
---
Modern engineering is rewriting the rulebook and revolutionising how we live.
In Mega Builds, Fred Mills - the founder of global construction platform The B1M - takes you inside ten of the most extraordinary engineering projects that are reshaping our modern world.
From a 170km-long smart city in Saudi Arabia, to Japan's levitating railway and France's bold quest for limitless energy, Mills delivers an eye-opening tour of the biggest engineering challenges set to change the world as we know it.
By the end of this book, you'll learn:
Why the world's biggest city has been built in the worst place imaginable.
Where the vision of a single ruler in the desert is rewriting our understanding of what's possible.
What drives us to build ever-higher buildings and design ever-faster trains.
And above all, how the dizzying scale of human imagination will inform the future of the man-made world.
Written in Fred's signature accessible style, Mega Builds demystifies the complexities while exploring the economic, environmental and societal stakes of building at unprecedented scale.
The trajectory of our civilisation is being authored today all around us, not in words on a page, but in steel and concrete.
Meet the projects and people set to transform our very experience of life on earth.
Praise for Mega Builds:
'A fascinating exploration of the world's biggest and boldest construction projects.' - Sadiq Khan, Mayor of London
'Fred has a gift for turning megaprojects into stories you can feel.' - Grady Hillhouse, author of Engineering in Plain Sight and creator of Practical Engineering
'Superb... Mills rightly celebrates how thinking big is often the right answer.' - Christian Wolmar, author of British Rail and The Rise of the Railway
Reviews / Votes
A wide-eyed, joyous and infectiously fun look at how human ingenuity and enormous machines are tackling some of the biggest engineering challenges the world has dared to take on. A ceaselessly uplifting and positive book. -- Mark Cooper-Jones, author of This Way Up by the Map Men With more globe-trotting than an international spy and access to structures that would make a Bond villain wince mid-monologue, Mega Builds reveals the feats shaping the 21st century and the mind-boggling world the next generation stands to inherit. -- Chris Broad, author of Abroad in Japan Fred has a gift for turning megaprojects into stories you can feel, and his perspective is equal parts grounded, inspiring, and forward-looking.' -- Grady Hillhouse, author of Engineering in Plain Sight and creator of Practical Engineering This is a superb counterpoint to the usual media negativity around big projects that are the product of human ambition. Mills rightly celebrates how thinking big is often the right answer. -- Christian Wolmar, author of Blood, Iron and Gold: How the Railways Transformed the WorldMore details
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Ebury Publishing
Target group
College/higher education
Professional and scholarly
Dimensions
Height: 239 mm
Width: 158 mm
Thickness: 35 mm
Weight
564 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-7535-6161-4 (9780753561614)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
E-Book
05/2026
Virgin Digital
€14.99
Available for download
Book
05/2026
W H Allen
€22.50
Available immediately
Person
Fred Mills is a British filmmaker and founder of The B1M YouTube channel, the largest and most subscribed-to construction channel in the world with over 4 million subscribers.
From California to Japan, Fred has had unprecedented on-the-ground access inside some of our planet's biggest megaprojects - no one else has travelled to so many. From walking into a nuclear fusion reactor, to climbing a megatall skyscraper and becoming the industry's leading mental health advocate, Fred's experiences and insights have made him the top construction influencer worldwide.
From California to Japan, Fred has had unprecedented on-the-ground access inside some of our planet's biggest megaprojects - no one else has travelled to so many. From walking into a nuclear fusion reactor, to climbing a megatall skyscraper and becoming the industry's leading mental health advocate, Fred's experiences and insights have made him the top construction influencer worldwide.