{"id":116592,"date":"2025-08-27T09:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-08-27T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.freethink.com\/?post_type=ftm_article&p=116592"},"modified":"2025-08-27T15:02:46","modified_gmt":"2025-08-27T19:02:46","slug":"eiffel-tower-techno-dystopian","status":"publish","type":"ftm_article","link":"https:\/\/www.freethink.com\/the-material-world\/eiffel-tower-techno-dystopian","title":{"rendered":"The Eiffel Tower was considered techno-dystopian"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Eiffel Tower is as iconic of France as croissants and baguettes and equally emblematic of Paris as Notre-Dame or the Arc de Triomphe. Yet, before completion for the 1889 World\u2019s Fair, the project was treated by some as an industrialist \u201cTower of Babel\u201d that was anti-ethical to French taste and culture.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A month after construction began in 1887, a group of prominent French artists published an open letter, titled \u201cArtists against the Eiffel Tower.\u201d It was featured on the front page of Parisian newspaper Les Temps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The letter, signed by some of the greatest creative minds in France, implored that the project \u201cmenaced French art and history\u201d and called the tower a “useless and monstrous” structure, which would “irreparably disfigure and dishonour” Paris.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The entire text, translated from French, can be read and heard here<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Its authors claimed this \u201cdizzyingly ridiculous tower\u201d would overshadow Paris\u2019s iconic monuments, like Notre Dame and the Arc de Triomphe, leaving all Parisian architecture “humiliated” and “dwarfed” in the “shadow of this odious column of bolted sheet metal.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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To these artisans, the project was \u201cindustrial vandalism,\u201d a \u201cstupefying dream\u201d from the “grotesque and mercantile imagination of a machine-maker.\u201d They were, of course, referring to Gustave Eiffel \u2014 the tower\u2019s designer and namesake.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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One source of contempt for the project was that Eiffel, an engineer, won the contract to build his tower over<\/a> venerated architect Jules Bourdais, who had initially proposed a tower made of stone, more fitting with Parisian architecture.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The official Eiffel Tower site describes<\/a> this tension:<\/p>\n\n\n

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The two projects were total opposites: stone versus iron, an architect versus an engineer, classic versus modern… The battle took place in the press, with Eiffel and Bourdais mobilizing their respective supporters.<\/p>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Opponents of Eiffel sowed concerns that the structure \u2014 soon to be the largest tower in the world \u2014 would collapse in high winds. Some scientists were even purportedly concerned<\/a> that the iron structure might magnetize everything in France \u2014 that would, in turn, \u201cdemoralize everything with nails for a long distance.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Harrisburg Telegraph Harrisburg, Pennsylvania \u00b7 June 09, 1887<\/figcaption><\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n