The exorbitant entry ticket prices for The Shard, the UK’s tallest building, which is to open for public on February 1, is not dissuading Londoners and tourists from absorbing a panoramic view of London from 800ft (244m) up on the 1,016ft (310m) high skyscraper which is adjacent to London Bridge station. The tickets to absorb the capital’s glory from The Shard will cost £24.95 for adults and £18.95 for children.

Despite the steep prices, the first two days of The Shard’s opening have been sold out. Visitors to The Shard, will have to take two lifts to get to level 68 for 40-mile views and then they can go up as far as the 72nd floor where viewing area is partly in the open. In the viewing areas, visitors can look through freely provided telescopes called Tell:scopes.

The Tell:scopes are not only useful when the visibility is poor, but they can be used to see what the view would be like during different times of the day such as clear-day view, sunset view and night view. While using the telescope, when focused on a particular landmark, the visitor can receive audio information about the landmark.

For a night view, visitors to The Shard can absorb the spectacular view until 10pm each day. The day viewers can begin to venture inside The Sahrd when it opens at 9am everyday. Also featured inside the The Shard are funny murals of 140 famous Londoners depicting the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge as a Pearly King and Queen, London Mayor Boris Johnson shining the shoes of a top-hatted former mayor Ken Livingstone and the Queen riding on a scooter with corgi.

The glassy, triangular-shaped Shard also includes 600,000sq ft of offices, three floors of restaurants and a 200-room Shangri-La hotel which is due to open this summer. 10 luxury apartments, which are likely to be sold at £50m each, are also part of The Shard, which is part of a £2bn redevelopment of the London Bridge area.