Louvre Pyramid

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The large glass pyramid of le musée du Louvre

The Louvre Pyramid is a large glass and metal pyramid, surrounded by three smaller ones, in the courtyard of the Musée du Louvre Museum in Paris, France. The large pyramid serves as the main entrance to the museum. Completed in 1989, ^[1] it has become a landmark for the city of Paris.

1 Design and construction
2 Original proposal
3 Controversy
4 666 panes: an urban legend
5 References in popular culture
6 References
7 External links

[edit] Design and construction

Interior of the Louvre Pyramid, 1989

Commissioned by then French president François Mitterrand in 1984 it was designed by the architect Ieoh Ming Pei, and is responsible for the design of the Miho Museum in Japan among others. The structure, which was constructed entirely with glass segments, reaches a height of 20.6 meters (about 70 feet); its square base has sides of 35 meters (115 feet). It consists of 603 rhombus-shaped and 70 triangular glass segments^[2].

The pyramid and the underground lobby underneath it were created because of a series of problems with the Louvre's original main entrance, which could no longer handle an enormous number of visitors on an everyday basis. Visitors entering through the pyramid descend into the spacious lobby then re-ascend into the main Louvre buildings. Several other museums have duplicated this concept, most notably the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago. The construction work on the pyramid base and underground lobby was carried out by Dumez^[3].

[edit] Original proposal

It is not well known that a baroque pyramid was proposed for the centennial celebrations of the 1789 French Revolution.^{[citation needed]} It is possible that the architect, I. M. Pei, was aware of these designs when he chose a pyramid form, for the bicentennial celebrations of 1989.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] Controversy

The Pyramid surrounded by the Louvre buildings

The construction of the pyramid triggered considerable controversy because many people felt that the futuristic edifice looked quite out of place in front of the Louvre Museum with its classical architecture. Certain detractors ascribed a "Pharaonic complex" to Mitterrand. Others came to appreciate the juxtaposing of contrasting architectural styles as a successful merger of the old and the new, the classical and the ultra-modern.

The main pyramid is actually only the largest of several glass pyramids that were constructed near the museum, including the downward-pointing La Pyramide Inversée that functions as a skylight in an underground mall in front of the museum.

During the design phase, there was a proposal that the design include a spire on the pyramid to simplify window washing. This proposal was eliminated because of objections from I. M. Pei.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] 666 panes: an urban legend

It has been claimed by some that the glass panes in the Louvre Pyramid number exactly 666, "the number of the beast", often associated with Satan. Various historical enthusiasts have speculated at the purpose of this factoid. For instance, Dominique Stezepfandt's book François Mitterrand, Grand Architecte de l'Univers declares that "the pyramid is dedicated to a power described as the Beast in the Book of Revelation (...) The entire structure is based on the number 6."

View of the outside from inside The Louvre Pyramid

The story of the 666 panes originated in the 1980s, when the official brochure published during construction did indeed cite this number (even twice, though a few pages earlier the total number of panes was given as 672 instead). The number 666 was also mentioned in various newspapers. The Louvre museum however states that the finished pyramid contains 673 glass panes (603 rhombi and 70 triangles).[1] A higher figure was obtained by David A. Shugarts, who reports that the pyramid contains 689 pieces of glass (Secrets of the Code, edited by Dan Burstein, p. 259). Shugarts obtained the figure from the offices of I.M. Pei. Various attempts to actually count the panes in the pyramid have produced slightly discrepant results, but there are definitely more than 666. A quick calculation based on 18 units per edge with two tiers removed in the center at the entrance easily confirms the 673 number.

The myth resurfaced in 2003, when Dan Brown incorporated it in his best-selling novel The Da Vinci Code. Here the protagonist reflects that "this pyramid, at President Mitterrand's explicit demand, had been constructed of exactly 666 panes of glass - a bizarre request that had always been a hot topic among conspiracy buffs who claimed 666 was the number of Satan" (p. 21). However, David A. Shugarts reports that according to a spokeswoman of the offices of I.M. Pei, the French President never specified the number of panes to be used in the pyramid. Noting how the 666 rumor circulated in some French newspapers in the mid-1980s, she commented: "If you only found those old articles and didn't do any deeper fact checking, and were extremely credulous, you might believe the 666 story" (Secrets of the Code, p. 259).

[edit] References in popular culture

(See La Pyramide Inversée for further discussion.)

The Louvre and its pyramid also starred in the 2004 film, Team America: World Police, but only in model form. The model was destroyed very early on during the action scene involving it.