A glance, an object, a symbol, the tower is everything man wants it to be and everything is infinite. A spectacle observed and observing, a useless and irreplaceable building, a familiar world and a heroic symbol, a witness to a century and an ever-new monument, an inimitable object constantly reproduced… (Roland Barthes, The Eiffel Tower, Delpirre ed. 1964).
The Eiffel Tower was the tallest structure in the world at the time of its construction and has been replicated in various locations around the globe. Although many modern buildings surpass it in height, it remains unique.
Its construction began in 1889 and lasted 2 years, 2 months, and 5 days, a true technical and architectural feat. A "realized utopia," a technological triumph, at the end of the 19th century it was a demonstration of French ingenuity personified by Gustave Eiffel, a high point of the industrial age.
Designed to last only 20 years, it was saved thanks to the scientific experiments promoted by Gustave Eiffel, who built it for the 1889 Universal Exposition commemorating the centenary of the French Revolution. It served for the first radiographic transmissions, followed by telecommunications: radio signals from the tower to the Pantheon in 1898, military radio in 1903, the first public radio broadcast in 1925, and later television, culminating in TNT more recently.
The tower at the heart of the events
Since the 1980s, the monument has been regularly renovated, restored and adapted for an ever-growing public.
Over the decades, the Eiffel Tower has witnessed remarkable feats, extraordinary illuminations, and prestigious visitors. A mythical and audacious landmark, it has always inspired artists and challenged them.
It is the setting for numerous events of international importance (lighting of the lights, centenary of the tower, pyrotechnic show of the year 2000, painting campaigns, flashes of light, blue tower to indicate the French Presidency of the European Union or multicolored for its 120 years, unusual installations such as a skating rink, a garden, etc.).
The magic of light
Like all towers, it allows you to see and be seen, with a spectacular ascent, a unique panoramic view of Paris, a resplendent beacon in the sky of the capital.
The tower also represents the magic of light. Its illumination, its flashes of light, and its bright beacon rekindle dreams every night.
Inaugurated on December 31, 1985, designed by Pierre Bideau, lighting engineer, composed of 336 projectors, equipped with high-pressure sodium lamps of yellow-orange color.
This lighting, which was a worldwide and unanimous success, marked the starting point, in Paris and in the major cities of France and the world, of a renaissance in the nighttime enhancement of monuments.
The beams of light, directed from bottom to top, illuminate the Eiffel Tower from within its structure. Since 1958, replacing the 1,290 projectors that illuminated the Tower from the outside, they highlight the monument's delicate metal structure and light up the areas frequented by visitors at night until the Tower closes. In addition to their aesthetic appeal, they are also essential for the safety of the Tower's nighttime operation.
The projectors turn on in less than 10 minutes. Sensors activate them at dusk.
In 2004, they were replaced by projectors with an electrical power of 600 watts instead of the previous 1 kW, representing an energy saving of approximately 40%. This improved light output preserves the full beauty of the final appearance.
Since then, every 4 years, SETE technicians proceed to renew the 336 light bulbs in the spotlights, which give the Eiffel Tower its golden mantle every night.
Contrary to what many people think, the nighttime illumination of the Tower (golden cloak) represents only about 4% of the monument's annual energy bill.
In December 2019, the four 2000W spotlights that had illuminated the antenna since 1985 were replaced by LED spotlights, which are 10 times less powerful and use less energy.
For the flashing effect, 5,000 lights, each containing a 6-watt xenon lamp, are installed on each side of the Tower; that is, a total of 20,000 lamps and 120 kW of total installed power.
A team composed of SETE technicians and professional working at heights loads an average of 300 to 400 lamps into the installation.
The blinking light is an installation that consumes very little energy, approximately 8800 kWh per year, which is equivalent to the annual electricity consumption of a 30 m² studio apartment occupied by two people. It represents 0.4% of the monument's annual electricity consumption.
The most visited monument in the world
A symbol of France in the world, a balcony of Paris, it currently has almost 7 million visitors a year (of which 75% are foreigners), making it the most visited paid monument in the world.
It is universal, like the Tower of Babel, because nearly 300 million visitors, regardless of age or origin, have come from all corners of the planet to discover it since its inauguration in 1889.
The tower in figures
An object of discord, greed, and fascination, the Eiffel Tower leaves no one indifferent. Rich with a history full of changes.
| Current height | 324 meters |
|---|---|
| Initial height without antenna | 312 meters |
| Total width | 125 meters (on the ground) |
| One foot/pillar width | 25 meters (on the ground) |
| First floor | 57 meters, 4415 square meters |
| Second floor | 115 meters, 1430 square meters |
| The summit | 276 meters, 250 square meters |
| Elevators | 5 elevators to the second floor, 2 x 2 duolifts to the top |
| Weight of the metal structure | 7,300 tons |
| Total weight | 10,100 tons |
| Number of rivets | 2 500 000 |
| Numberof iron pieces | 18 038 |
| Pillars | Four pillars, a square 125 meters on each side |
| Design | 18,038 metal pieces |
| 5,300 workshop designs | |
| 50 engineers and designers | |
| Construction | 150 workers at the Levallois-Perret factory |
| Between 150 and 300 workers on the construction site | |
| 2,500,000 rivets | |
| 7,300 tons of iron | |
| 60 tons of paint |
One of the most famous and imitated monuments in the world
Since the construction of the Eiffel Tower, the obsession of other places to have their own tower has spread throughout the world. Many monuments have imitated the symbol of Paris and France: some are inspired by the work of Gustave Eiffel; others closely resemble it or are miniature replicas.
In 1889, the year of the tower's inauguration, the Washington Monument, at 169 meters tall, held the world record for four years. It would be more than forty years before the tower was dethroned by the Chrysler Building in New York (319m), which was itself surpassed in 1949 by the Empire State Building (381m). Today, many towers reach dizzying heights, such as the Taipei 11 Tower (508 meters) and, more recently, the Burj Khalifa (828 meters).
| The work begins | January 26, 1887 |
| The leg assembly begins | July 1, 1887 |
| The first floor is finished | April 1, 1888 |
| The second floor is finished | August 14, 1888 |
| The assembly will finally end with the summit | March 31, 1889 |
The design of the Eiffel Tower
The project for a 300-meter tower was born out of preparation for the Universal Exhibition of 1889.
The proposal was "to study the possibility of erecting an iron tower on the Champ de Mars, with a square base, 125 meters on each side and 300 meters high." Selected from among 107 projects, the one submitted by Gustave Eiffel, businessman, Maurice Koechlin and Emile Nouguier, engineers, and Stephen Sauvestre, architect, was accepted.
In June 1884, the two main engineers of the Eiffel company, Émile Nouguier and Maurice Koechlin, had the idea of a very tall tower, designed as a large pillar with 4 columns separated at the base as legs that joined at the top, joined together by metal beams arranged at regular intervals.
The tower project was an extension of this principle, with a height of 300 meters, equivalent to the symbolic figure of 1,000 feet for bridge supports. On September 18, 1884, Eiffel patented “a new design that allowed the construction of metal supports and posts capable of reaching a height of over 300 meters.”.
To make the project more acceptable to the public, Nouguier and Koechlin asked architect Stephen Sauvestre to work on the project's appearance.
The construction
The assembly of the legs begins on July 1, 1887 and ends twenty-one months later.
All the components were prepared at the Levallois-Perret factory near Paris, the headquarters of the Eiffel company. Each of the tower's 18,000 pieces was designed and calculated before being precisely marked and assembled in sections approximately five meters long. On-site, between 150 and 300 workers, directed by a team of veterans experienced in large metal viaducts, were responsible for assembling this gigantic structure.
Four men to set a rivet
The joints were temporarily held in place with bolts, later replaced by hot-set rivets. As they cooled, they contracted, thus securing the pieces together. It took a team of four men to set a rivet: one to apply heat, one to hold it in place, one to shape the head, and the last to hammer it in. Only a third of the 2,500,000 rivets used in the tower were set directly on the ground.
The legs rest on concrete foundations installed a few meters below ground level on a bed of compacted gravel. Each metal edge rests on its own pilaster, joined to the others by walls, on which it exerts a pressure of 3 to 4 kilograms per square centimeter.
On the Seine side, watertight metal coffers and injected compressed air were used, which allowed workers to work below the water level.
The tower was assembled with the help of wooden scaffolding and small steam cranes attached to the tower itself.
The assembly of the first floor was carried out with the help of twelve temporary wooden scaffolds 30 meters high, and four larger scaffolds 45 meters high.
Some "sandboxes" and hydraulic jacks, later replaced by fixed wedges, allowed the position of the metalwork to be adjusted with millimeter pressure.
The joining of the large beams of the first level was completed on December 7, 1887. The pieces were hoisted with the help of steam cranes that in turn went up the tower, using the slides provided for the elevators.
Debates and controversies about the Eiffel Tower
Even before its construction was complete, the tower was already at the center of a storm of debate. Ridiculed by critics from prominent figures in the world of literature and the arts, the tower managed to overcome these challenges and enjoy well-deserved success.
After the publication of various pamphlets or articles throughout the year 1886, the works had only just begun when a protest by the artists took place on February 14, 1887.
Published in the newspaper Le Temps, this "Protest Against Mr. Eiffel's Tower" is addressed to Mr. Alphand, director of works for the Exposition. It is signed by some of the great names in the world of letters and the arts: Charles Gounod, Guy de Maupassant, Alexandre Dumas fils, François Coppée, Leconte de Lisle, Sully Prudhomme, William Bouguereau, Ernest Meissonier, Victorien Sardou, Charles Garnier, and others whom posterity has treated less favorably.
Other pamphleteers went even further with this violent diatribe and made such insults as: "tragic street lamp" (Léon Bloy); "skeleton of a watchtower" (Paul Verlaine); "iron mast of hard, unfinished, confused, deformed rigging" (François Coppée); "tall and thin pyramid of iron ladders, giant skeleton lacking grace, whose base seems made to carry a formidable monument of Cyclopes, abortion of a ridiculous and thin profile of a factory chimney" (Maupassant); "a factory pipe under construction, a framework waiting to be covered by stones or bricks, this funnel-shaped wire enclosure, this suppository riddled with holes" (Joris-Karl Huysmans).
The controversies died down on their own once the tower's construction was finished, given the undeniable presence of the completed structure and its immense popular success. It received two million visitors during the 1889 exhibition.
Source: TOUREIFFEL.PARIS THE OFFICIAL WEBSITE OF THE EIFFEL TOWER.
