Eiffel Tower

he Eiffel Tower (/ˈaɪfəl/ EYE-fəl; French: tour Eiffel [tuʁ‿ɛfɛl] (About this sound listens)) is a wrought-iron lattice tower on the Champ de Mars in Paris, France. It is named after the engineer Gustave Eiffel, whose company designed and built the tower.

Locally nicknamed "La dame de fer" (French for "Iron Lady"), it was constructed from 1887 to 1889 as the centerpiece of the 1889 World's Fair and was initially criticized by some of France's leading artists and intellectuals for its design, but it has become a global cultural icon of France and one of the most recognizable structures in the world.[3] The Eiffel Tower is the most visited monument with an entrance fee in the world; 6.91 million people ascended it in 2015. The Tower was made a Monument Historique in 1964 and named part of UNESCO World Heritage Site ("Paris, Banks of the Seins") in 1991. [4]

The tower is 324 meters (1,063 ft) tall, about the same height as an 81-story building, and the tallest structure in Paris. Its base is square, measuring 125 meters (410 ft) on each side. During its construction, the Eiffel Tower surpassed the Washington Monument to become the tallest man-made structure in the world, a title it held for 41 years until the Chrysler Building in New York City was finished in 1930. It was the first structure in the world to surpass both the 200-meter and 300-meter mark in height. Due to the addition of a broadcasting aerial at the top of the tower in 1957, it is now taller than the Chrysler Building by 5.2 meters (17 ft). Excluding transmitters, the Eiffel Tower is the second tallest free-standing structure in France after the Millau Viaduct.