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Designed by the eminent architect, Gustave Eiffel, the Eiffel Tower heralded a new age for engineering. Both industrial and elegant, it symbolised an era known as the Belle Époque, where beauty and innovation in art and architecture were celebrated in the late 19th century.
Soaring 324m above Paris, this awe-inspiring triumph of style over substance was only ever intended as a temporary structure. During the early 1900s, however, the need for wireless communications saved the Eiffel Tower from the scrapyard. For 40 years, it reigned as the world’s tallest building, until New York’s Chrysler Building was built in 1929.
Eiffel’s design was chosen from 700 other proposals, due in part to his reputation as the leading European authority on aerodynamics and the effect of wind on high steel frames. Eiffel calculated that his tower’s four curving base columns would absorb the bending and shearing effects of the wind.
And his engineering vision paid off – even in the strongest winds the tower never shifts more than 115mm. Architects in the later part of the 20th century followed many of Eiffel’s principles for steel-framed skyscrapers.
Amazing, really, when you consider many Parisians of the time feared it was going to be an eyesore.
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