You Can Now See a Piece of Paris in Manila

IMAGE History website

(SPOT.ph) No trip to Paris, the City of Love, is complete without a visit to the 986-foot Eiffel Tower. It has lights that glisten at night and provide an elegant touch to the city's skyline. But let's face it, not all of us can fly all the way to France just to marvel at this architectural wonder from the 19th Century. It's a good thing that you can now see a part of the Eiffel Tower Staircase until January 15, 2018 at the Greenbelt Park. There's also an exhibit at the Greenbelt 3 Lobby in Makati.

IMAGE Christa I. De La Cruz

The incredible piece of historical architecture measures 5 meters in height and 1.7 meters in diameter, and weighs 1.7 tons. It was brought to the Philippines through the partnership of Ayala Malls Greenbelt and Janat Paris, a family-owned Parisian tea house whose patriarch (Janat Dores) once shared a strong friendship with the renowned engineer and architect Gustave Eiffel. It's really not much compared to the 324-meter height of what was once the world's tallest structure (until 1930 when the Chrysler Building was built in New York), but touching even just a small part of it can make you appreciate its beauty and history.

IMAGE Christa I. De La Cruz

IMAGE Christa I. De La Cruz

The Eiffel Tower was inaugurated at the Exposition Universelle of 1889 as part of the celebration of the 100th Anniversary of the French Revolution. It was a design proposal submitted by Eiffel along with architect Stephen Sauvestre and engineers Maurice Koechlin and Emile Nouguier. Because of its ambitious blueprint, construction lasted for two years, two months, and five days with 132 workers assembling its 18,000 parts right at Champ-de-Mars, the center of Paris.

IMAGE Christa I. De La Cruz

A lithographic print of the Eiffel Tower from Exposition Universelle (1889)

IMAGE Christa I. De La Cruz

Believe it or not, Parisian artists weren't as enthusiastic about its radical design that 300 of them signed a manifesto that ran in the Le Temps newspaper on Valentine’s Day in 1887. They called it "useless and monstrous" and considered the architectural design a threat to French art and history. The signatories could have just waited for 20 years, since the Eiffel Tower was initially meant to be just a temporary installation.

IMAGE Christa I. De La Cruz

Original Gustave Eiffel Letter (February 23, 1907)

But we're just glad that the architect himself found a way to save his precious tower. He added a 24-meter antenna (which not only added height to the 300-meter structure, but also made it surpass Chrysler Building's height) in 1898, giving it a huge value as a radiotelegraph station. It was later used for military communications during the war, as a scientific laboratory for French astronomers and meteorologists, and even as a popular site for daredevils to test their aerial stunts.

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Nowadays, it remains to be one of the most romantic places on Earth.

The Eiffel Tower Staircase is on display until January 15, 2018 at Greenbelt Park, Greenbelt 3, Esperanza Street, Ayala Center, Makati City.