Paris skyscraper to rival tower

Lighthouse.A new building powered partially by wind will be rising in Paris. The new Lighthouse skyscraper will be almost as tall as the Eiffel Tower.

It is due to be completed in 2012 and will cost an estimated 800m euros ($1.05bn) to build. Its twin structure will combine a rectangular base with a soaring, organic-shaped tower, capped by a field of wind turbines.

Last year, Thom Mayne was awarded the Pritzker prize, the world's top architecture award. "It's about an icon, and one of the major buildings in Paris," he said of the winning project. He added the building would be "a prototype for a green building" with a wind farm generating its own heating and a "double skin" of steel and glass to a self-cooling mechanism for the hotter months.

Link & Image: BBC
Tags: | | |

Comments