Defying the Nature; the Atlanterhavsveien

Not all architecture is supposed to keep us inside; some of it has the sole purpose of allowing us to reach from one location to another. Bridges, tunnels, roads, railroads, and to some degree, airports, rail stations and ports all serve the purpose of transporting people, and hence, are transitional structures. What this means is that, the people using these structures do not intend to stay within these structures, but use them as a tool to reach a purpose.

Still, this does not mean that such structures should only be utilitarian and lack aesthetic aspects. Many airports around the world today feature on the covers of architectural magazines, and bridges in fact make up an integral part of a city's identity in places like San Francisco, Istanbul or New York. It would come as no surprise, then, Norway, with its insistence on Scandinavian design principles that involve clean, socially responsible and functional designs, would come up with a both functional and aesthetically pleasing solution to a decades long problem.

The problem was connecting the island of Averøy - a municipality of around 6000 people - to Eide on the mainland in Møre og Romsdal county in northern Norway. This connection featured a crossing of Hustadvika, a rough and unsheltered part of the Norwegian sea that has always been difficult to navigate. Averøy is a recent town, having been formed as a municipality after the merger of Kvernes, Kornstad and Bremsnes in 1964, although the village of Kvernes has had a municipality since 1838, and it has a church (Kvernes State Church) dating back to the 14th century that now serves as a museum. Hence, the problem of providing a transportation fixed link to the island predates the formation of Averøy. And the elegant Norwegian solution to this problem gave the world the Atlantic Ocean Road - or Atlanterhavsveien in Norwegian.

Plans for a fixed link to the island had first surfaced in early 20th century. However, at the time the link was planned to be part of the national railroad network rather than a road project, in line with the trends of the period. The Rauma rail line project, a railroad from Åndalsnes in Rauma municipality to the town of Dombås in Lesja municipality to the south of it, both in Møre og Romsdal county, was to allow for railroad access to the county by connecting with the Oslo-Trondheim main railroad; and the suggestion to extend this line to the coastal towns was studied in 1920s. However, although a route selection had been made that would have roughly followed the path of the current road link, the rail line was not built beyond Åndalsnes. Norwegian parliament eventually abandoned the plans for a railroad in favor of a road link in 1935.

Although a preliminary approval for a road link was given in 1935, momentum for the project was not achieved until the 1970s. A toll company - Atlanterhavsveien AS - was formed in 1970 to pave the way for the construction; yet it wasn't until 1983 that Arne Rettedal, Minister of Local Government and Regional Development, championed a proposal to allow for job creation funds to be used for road projects.

Construction for the project started on 1 August 1983, although the speed of the construction left much to be desired; this in turn led to the Norwegian Public Roads Administration taking over the project in 1986. The project was completed in 1989, opening to traffic on the 7th of July of that year. Throughout its construction, the project suffered a whopping 12 European windstorms - a name given to extratropical cyclones that occur across Europe mostly in winter months.

The entire road is 8.3 kilometers long, 6.5 meters wide and built on several islands and skerries as a ring of viaducts and a total of eight bridges - the most significant being the Storseisundet Bridge that has been featured in many iconic photographs of the road. The road gradient reaches eight percent at certain places. At a total cost of 122 million NOK (roughly 17.4 million USD), the road was partly financed by tolls, and partly by state grants along with the job creation funds tapped into; the payment of the project costs in 1999 allowed for the removal of the toll.

The Atlantic Ocean Road was classified as a National Tourist Route, thanks to the influx of tourists vying to see the dangerous seas crossed by a road project. In fact, the road was Norway's ninth most visited natural tourist attraction with over quarter million visitors. Deemed by The Guardian "the world's best road trip" in 2006, it has also featured in many auto commercials due to its extreme nature. The route also won the title of "Norwegian construction of the century" in 2005, further cementing the achievement of the project.

Although initially thought of as a link to a village of several thousand people on a Norwegian island, the Atlanterhavsveien transformed into a destination by itself, attracting thousands of people to its pavement surrounded by the rough seas. That in itself is a testament to man's defiance of nature.

Palace of Culture, the Ugly Duckling of Warsaw

The Soviet era is not a time remembered fondly - not in the Western world, nor in the countries that had been under Soviet influence. Sporadic nostalgia for military might occurs here and there, and those who have not been able to get accustomed to the Western - capitalist - way of life seem to yearn for the Communists to regain power. Yet, countries of the former Eastern Bloc have almost entirely shed their old coats for shinier new ones. Most of them have even made it into the rich European club of European Union, extending the reach of Western values to Russian borders.

With the demise of the Eastern Bloc and the assumption of capitalist shools of thought in Eastern Europe, countries of the region have also adopted certain other cultural cues; media has changed, eating habits have become different, travel and tourism has taken a new shape, and, most visibly perhaps, city planning and architecture has shifted. Cities that were once small scale replicas of Moscow built new skyscrapers to host the influx of foriegn private investment, and Soviet era housings left their place - at least for the lucky few - to Western style residential projects. Eastern Bloc countries moved fast to replace the structures left from the Soviet domination era with newer ones, hoping that it would help them usher in a new period.

Yet, there were a few buildings that seemed to deserve a second life and thus to be spared the wrecking ball. These monumental structures were definitely Soviet, but also architecturally significant and historically telling; they were testaments to a certain period of the country's history. Apart from the prohibitive cost of demolishing such a monumental building, what good would it do to erase part of the past entirely, when it could stand and remind people of the mistakes made?

That is probably why Poland chose to keep its Soviet behemoth - aptly named the Palace of Culture and Science - intact. The Palace of Culture and Science - or PKiN - is as of today still the tallest building of Warsaw, and indeed the eighth tallest in the entire EU. Originally named the Joseph Stalin Palace of Culture and Science but later renamed to its current title thanks to the destalinization (a term coined to denote the removal of Stalin references from Soviet sphere of influence after his demise, began by Khrushchev), the building was conceived as "a gift from the Soviet people to the Polish nation".

Architect Lev Rudnev, the mind behind many similarly themed buildings thoughout the Eastern Bloc - including the arguably more famous Moscow State University building - designed the building according to the then popular style of - you guessed it - Stalinist architecture. This style was an architectural abomination, in that it rejected excess in tems of decoration and opted for austere exteriors, while at the same time it embraced extremes in tems of scale. The result was usually huge concrete-grey structures with little to no decorative touches, with the only embellishments also serving a functional purpose for the building.

PKiN is no different in terms of its architectural standing. Built between 1952 and 1955 - peak of Stalinist architecture - it is a building that meant to symbolize the basic Soviet ideology: a building is supposed to look no better than the purpose of the building justifies, but its size is meant to shock and awe onlookers. It is a rather plain building, with majority of its decoration reserved for the pinnacles of the main tower and the four semi-pinnacles on each corner. In fact, the masonry on top of these pinnacles were copied from Renaissance era palaces of Krakow and Zamosc (two Polish cities with city centers listed in the UNESCO World Heritage List), making them the architect's only reference to Polish history and architecture. Otherwise, the overall architecture of the building is quite similar to its counterparts in Moscow and elsewhere.

The building was mostly loathed by Warsaw residents from its inception, as to them it symbolized Soviet domination of their country. In addition, due to its sheer size, towering a whopping 188 meters above the city - 237 meters if the spire is included - it is claimed to having destroyed the aesthetical proportions of a once beautiful medieval city. However, due to extensive damage to Warsaw during the World War II, most earlier architecture in the city had already been destroyed and the impact of the building to the skyline in this aspect has been relatively small. Thanks to all the negative feelings towards it, the structure has assumed many nicknames, including clown, Stalin's syringe, Russian wedding or elephant in lacy underwear.

The clocks at the top of the structure were not present in the original, austere design; they were added to the facade in 2000 for the millennium celebrations. For a two year period after that, the tower was the world's talles clock tower, thanks to these four clocks.

The tower covers a total area of 123000 square meters on 42 floors, and boasts a total of 3288 rooms. Among the occupants of the current form of the building, one can count cinemas, theaters, museums, as well as a large conference hall that seats 3000 people. A university, Collegium Civitas, occupies 11th and 12th floors of the building. A terrace on the 30th floor offers panoramic views of downtown Warsaw.

Times change, governments and governing ideologies come and go. With them, they usher in new architecture, and when they eventually do leave, they do not take their works with them. We people are left to live with the remnants of ideologies past, and remember them in order to learn from from them. That is the only way to not make the same mistakes again.

From Mud to God: The Mosque of Djenne

It is clear that religion play a significant role in our lives. It is a power to be reckoned with, a source of inner strength, an inspiration for many. This has been true in the past, and it is quite possibly more so now. It comes as no surprise that most architectural landmarks of mankind stem from the need to be loved by God - or gods, as we think of buildings as a way to impress our deities into liking us more than the next civilization, and favoring us above the rest. This is probably why, even in the remotest corners of the world, most structures that have survived the wrath of nature and the cruelty of passing time are those devoted to worshipping. We tend to keep our houses of worship in better condition than our houses of residence.

When one thinks of Africa, the first thing that comes to mind is poverty; this has been the case for much of our recent history. An entire continent - the second largest and the second most populous in fact, with a fifth of its surface area and a seventh of its population - that has been mired with wars, internal and external conflict, disease, drought, famine and corruption and that has become synonymous with "Third World", it is home to more than a billion people. And yet, one has to think very hard to come up with a recent significant accomplishment from the continent, whether in terms of architecture or, anything else for that matter. Yet, even amidst all the poverty and desolation, African people manage to honor their deities. The Great Mosque of Djenne is a testament to that dedication.

Located in the historic town of Djenne in the Inland Niger Delta region of central Mali - which sits in the flood plain of the river Bani, the principal tributary of the Niger river in Mali - the Great Mosque of Djenne is a marvel in the middle of nothing. It is a building built entirely of adobe (the Spanish word for mud brick, which is a brick-like material made of sand, clay, water and any kind of fibrous organic material such as straw or sticks). The choice of material and the architectural style the building is constructed in is consistent with the Sudano-Sahelian style: An umbrella term used for indigenous architectural styles used commonly in Islamic West Africa.

The Sudano-Sahelian style characteristically features adobe, along with large wooden support beams that protrude from the building's facade - the beams used for both decoration and also as scaffolding during the maintenance of the structure. The style dates to as early as 250 B.C., and is still in use in the same region, which makes it one of the longest-lived architectural styles ever.

The first mosque to have occupied the spot is thought to date to the 13th century, although an exact date cannot be given. A wide band of over 120 years is estimated between 1200 A.D. and 1320 A.D. for the construction of this first structure - no actual document referencing the original mosque remains.

The first references to the mosque were made in 17th century, mentioning the building of a mosque by Sultan Kunburu, who converted to Islam and as a consequence, demolished his palace to make space for a new mosque. French explorer Rene Caillie - the first European ever to return alive from Timbuktu - in his trip to the area in 1828 wrote about the mosque, describing it as "a mosque built of earth, surmounted by two massive but not high towers; it is rudely constructed, though very large".

In fact, Caillie's visit coincides with the Fulani people's jihad and conquest of the town of Djenne. The Fulani people, one of the largest ethnic groups of Africa, had taken over the town, and their leader Seku Amadu had abandoned the original mosque in favor of a new and much more austere mosque that he commissioned between 1834 and 1836. This meant that the original mosque was left to fall into disrepair, a certain death verdict for an adobe building in the harsh African climate.

The disuse of the original mosque continued until the end of 19th century - with the French conquering Djenne in 1893, the fate of the building started to change. In 1906, French administrators of the town ordered the rebuilding of the original mosque, using forced labor, although there is strong doubt whether the final structure followed the plan of the original mosque in all aspects.

The current mosque, dating to the French-overseen construction in 1907, features sun-baked adobe walls joined by sand and earth mortar; the walls are coted with a special plaster that endows the structure with a smooth surface. The beams that jut from the walls, called toron, are of rodier palm tree trunks, and ceramic half-pipes are used on the roof to route water away from the building.

The mosque is built on a roughly square platform of 75 meter sides, raised 3 meters above the surrounding plain to protect from flooding of the Bani river. The corners of the outer walls are not precisely orthogonal, meaning that the building plan is not an exact square.

The prayer wall of the mosque faces east - towards Mecca as in all mosques - and is dominated by three boxy minarets, the talles being 16 meters high. The pinnacles on top of these three minarets are  - interestingly - topped with an ostrich egg. The prayer hall has a roof that is supported by arches almost as high as the roof itself, which results in a web of pillars that clutter the interior of the mosque, significantly reducing visibility. The floor of the prayer hall is of sandy earth.

The maintenance of the mosque is an annual event that the entire community takes part in. It involves food and music, and significant amount of hard labor that is required to restore the building to its state before the damages caused by the annual rains and cracks caused by temperature changes. First, the plaster that will be used during the repair is prepared in pits, overseen by guild masters, and children are employed in the constant stirring of the plaster during its preparation - an effort that can last a few days. Then, several men climb the scaffolding of the mosque and apply the plaster onto the building, while other men carry plaster from the pits to the building. Women carry water to the pits and to the workers during the entire effort. The mosque, above all, is a source of pride for residents of Djenne.

The Great Mosque of Djenne has been on the UNESCO World Heritage Site list since 1988, and rightfully so. As an important Islamic learning center since its construction - thanks to its madrasa (Islamic school) complex, it has been a cultural center for the region since its inception. And above all, it is a symbol of a poor people's dedication to their God, year after year.

In Memoriam: WTC Twin Towers

As the world completes yet another full rotation around the sun, another anniversary of one of the most tragic events in recent history is upon us. The September 11th of 2001, a balmy day in fall in New York City, is now almost universally associated with the terrible act of terrorism that occurred on that fateful day. As we conmemorate the 13th year of the September 11 attacks, the most meaningful piece of architecture to look at are the very same ones that were destroyed in those attacks - the World Trade Center twin towers - and remember them not only with their destruction along with many innocent lives, but also with their architectural significance.

The WTC twins, part of a vast seven-building development dubbed the World Trade Center, occupied multiple blocks of prime real estate in Lower Manhattan. The 110-story twin towers - namely the North Tower and the South Tower - were the crown jewels of the development, soaring 417 meters to the sky and holding the honor of being the tallest buildings of the time when they were completed on April 4, 1973. Along with five other buildings that made up the WTC complex, the center offered a whopping 1,240,000 square meters of office space to the city. Until their destruction in 2001, the towers carried an iconic meaning and stayed as highly visible landmarks of New York City.

Plans for a new development at the southwestern tip of Manhattan island were floating as early as the World War II period. The war had left the country's finances in shambles, and a return to normalcy would require the restoration of a sound financial sector. To do that properly, a financial center worth of global scale was needed, and New York City, specifically Manhattan, desperately in need of revitalization and full of opportunities, was the most obvious choice. In 1946, a bill was passed in the New York State legislature that envisaged the establishment of a world trade center which founded a corporation specifically for this purpose. An initial plan of 21 buildings built on ten city blocks was developed; although this plan was later put on hold in 1949 after the dissolving of the World Trade Corporation by the New York State legislature.

Later plans for a world trade center complex were pioneered by the business mogul David Rockefeller, who advocated that the Port Authority (of New York and New Jersey) - a transportation focused venture jointly owned by the two states neighboring the Hudson river, New York and New Jersey - should be the appropriate owner of the project. Following a yer of negotiations, the PANYNJ backed the project in 1961, and location scouting for the new center began. As Lower Manhattan had been left out of recent economic development that Midtown Manhattan had enjoyed, it was floated that this part of the island would be a logical choice for the location.

As the PANYNJ required the approval of both states of New York and New Jersey for the project, there was one issue: the project site would be in New York City, and that would mean spending of New Jersey's money for a project with little benefit to the state. To alleviate these concerns, the location for the center was selected on the shores of West Hudson close to New Jersey (contrary to earlier plans that called for an East Hudson location), and the H&M Railroad (later renamed PATH), a railroad company that operated between the two shores then in deep financial trouble, was acquired by the PANYNJ. Thus the project was born.

Further issues regarding the existing tenants of the location kept the project from going ahead, as courts were involved in the setllement of the issues pertaining to eminent domain. Finally in 1963, the courts gave the green light to the project, and the architect hired to design the center, Minoru Yamasaki, got to work on the daunting task. In 1964, initial plans for the center were made public, and further public outcry ensued: the sheer size of the project scared other real-estate landlords as a huge amount of subsidized office space would be flooding the market and eroding their profits. Nonetheless, these did not slow the project down.

The PANYNJ demanded at least 930,000 square meters of office space for the center, and Yamasaki had to come up with the eventual design that consisted of twin towers each with 110 floors to meet this requirement. An international style building was favored by Yamasaki, who designed two towers with square floor plans with 63 meter sides. His fear of heights dictated the size of the rather small windows of the building.

To overcome the puzzling task of fitting enough elevators to carry people within the towers, the concept of sky lobbies - earlier used in John Hancock Tower in Chicago - was adopted. In this design, several express elevators carried people to sky lobbies on floors 44 and 78, where people would transfer to local elevators to their floors. Other innovative techniques used for the center included the construction of a concrete slurry wall to keep the Hudson river water out of the foundation during construction, and wind experiments carried out in wind tunnels on small scale models of the towers.

Ather the groundbreaking in 1966, the construction team spent more than a full year building the slurry wall. Following the completion of the slurry wall, foundation works began; the actual work on the North Tower started in 1968 and on the South Tower in early 1969. Several mishaps occurred during the construction phase, including strikes, explosions, and other work-related accidents, all in all claiming the lives of 60 workers.

The topping out of the towers were in late 1970 and mid-1971 respectively, with tenants moving in the North Tower in December 1970 and the South Tower in January 1972. The 920,000 cubic meters of earth dug for the construction was used to add land to Manhattan along the West Hudson that measured 210 meters by 452 meters, which was used later for new development. The project overran its estimated budget of 350 million dollars by almost 200 percent, reaching nearly 900 million dollars.

The attacks carried out by al-Qaeda in 2001 led to the eventual collapse of both towers. The crash of the two passenger jets into the buildings resulted in a catastrophe that led to the death of 2752 people, including those present on the planes. The aftermath of the attacks involved one of the largest site clean-up efforts in modern times, and cost hundreds of millions of dollars. An architectural competition was carried out for a new WTC complex, and the proposal of Polish architect Daniel Libeskind was selected for the site. As of 2013, the crowning building of the new complex, the WTC Tower 1, had been completed, becoming the tallest building in the United States. May it have a trouble-free existence.

Reichstag: When a Building is Reborn from the Ashes

The histories of certain countries are more controversial, if not explosive, in nature. As opposed to nations with more serene pasts, these countries have a collection of wars, conflicts and cases of commotion under their belt. The US is one such nation; Japan is another. And Europe has no shortage of such countries, including the UK, France, and perhaps most notably, Germany.

As architecture is nothing but a reflection of the people that create it, it is a rather straightforward assumption that historical buildings of such nations is also full of controversy, not perhaps due to their unconventional architecture, but possibly because they have been - and perhaps still are - associated with the controversies attributed to the nation itself. Take for example the White House; in addition to being a major tourist attraction in Washington D.C., it is also a target for many fundamentalists around the world with a grudge against the US, thanks to its symbolism. Obviously then, the almighty Germany, being one of Europe's most aggressive nations throughout its history, has its own architectural blessing and curse, in the form of a federal assembly building: the Reichstag.

A new building to house the Reichstag - a term which itself was coined earler during the Holy Roman Empire period to denote the national diet - was born of simple necessity: The recently unified German Republic was in need of an assembly place for the national diet in its capital of Berlin. The unification in 1871 had meant that Berlin would house the nation's assembly, and temporary solutions devised to handle this task did not suffice and satisfy Wilhelm I, the first German emperor between the unification in 1871 and his death in 1888.

However, the location selected shortly after unification in 1872 for a new assembly building at the eastern end of Königsplatz was already occupied by an abandoned palace that belonged to Athanasius Raczynski, a wealthy Polish diplomat. Political wrangling between Wilhelm I and Otto von Bismarck regarding the contruction of the building and the issues related to the acquisition of the land for the Reichstag lasted for another decade; only in 1882 was an architectural competition held for the design works of the building.

Paul Wallot, a Frankfurt based architect, was declared as the winner of the competition among almost 200 contestants with his neo-Baroque design; although he was in fact given second place by the jury after his peer Friedrich von Thiersch (who was arguably a better architect than Wallot). Wallot moved to Berlin to oversee his work after this; in fact he did not produce any other significant architectural works throughout his career.

The construction of the edifice began in 1884, and lasted 10 years. Although Wilhelm I was able to be present at the laying of the foundation, he had passed away long before at its inauguration in 1894, which was instead presided over by his grandson, Wilhelm II. Featuring sculpture works by Otto Lessing (who also worked on Neue Kirche - New Church, Technical University of Berlin, Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church, Berlin Cathedral, Berlin State Library and Konzerthaus Berlin - Concert Hall of Berlin, all in the capital), the diet building did receive both acclaim for its magnificence and criticism for its arguably over-use of various architectural styles. 

The words "Dem Deutschen Volke" - to the German people - were carved above the main entrance of the building in 1916, which was ironic as this call for dempcracy from the diet building of an empire was swiftly answered in 1918; the end of the World War I meant the proclamation of a republic. The Weimar Republic that rose from the ashes of German Empire would be housed in the same building from 1918 to 1933. That year was what spelled disaster for both the edifice and Germany; a huge fire ravaged the Reichstag on February 27 of 1933, resulting in two things. First was the immediate abandonment of the building as the national assembly. The second was, due to suspicion regarding the fire, the responsibility for the disaster being attributed by the Nazis to the communists - which eventually helped them increase their hold on their power and introduce more totalitarian practices.

The building fell into disuse after this period and was further damaged during Allied air raids, and throughout the period of two Germanies it stayed abandoned, save for a terrible attempt to partially restore it. Paul Baumgarten took the task of restoration to his hands between 1961 and 1964, and during this period he stripped the building of its statues, decorations inside - and partially outside - only to leave a bare-bones structure - a work much criticized later.

A much better attempt to restore the building was carried out by the renowned architect Norman Foster after the unification of East and West Germany in 1990. After the decision to house the unified capital in Berlin once again was given, an architectural contest was held in 1992 for the task of renovation. Foster won this contest, and was given the go to perform his transformation; but before he began his work, Bulgarian-American artish Christo and his wife Jeanne-Claude wrapped the building in polypropylene - they had previously performed a similar exhibit at Pont Neuf in Paris - which was seen by millions of visitors.

Foster gutted the entire building, removed all modifications made by Baumgarten but left Cyrillic graffiti written by Soviet forces invading Berlin in 1945 intact. The reconstruction lasted until 1999, with first assembly of Bundestag - German diet - at the Reichstag on 19 April of that year, 66 years after the building was lost to fire. The reconstruction was such a huge success that the building became the second-most visited tourist attraction in Germany after Cologne Cathedral (with 2.7 million visitors in 2006). Visits to the Reichstag's magnificient glass dome - which offers 360 degree views of Berlin and the convening parliament down below - are possible by registration.

History is good at one thing, for certain: At repeating itself in various versions. The Reichstag building has found new life thanks to a twist of fate. Here's to hoping that the rest of its history does not repeat itself.

Tokyo Tower, the Oriental Eiffel

Most of us would agree that Paris would still be Paris without its icon, the Eiffel Tower, but not quite the same - just somewhat missing its a recognizable portion of its charm and magic. A lump of iron, what some Parisians had called its at its unveiling - and some still continue to do so - yet it gives the city the right kind of vibe and jazz. However, it is not the only metallic tower to adorn a major city. The Blackpool Tower, for example, soars 158 meters above the Irish Sea; and the Sutro Tower in San Francisco has been featured in countless movies as a backdrop.

All these structures, being built in a city dominated by Western culture, have earned their share of fame, which leaves one other major man-made behemoth in the shade when it comes to international renown. This steel tower, set in one of the world's largest metropolises, is none other than Tokyo Tower of Tokyo in Japan.

Tokyo Tower is a steel structure in the form of a lattice tower - a free-standing framework tower that was intended for communication and tourism purposes. It stands 333 meters above Minato in downtown Tokyo (original plans had called for an even taller tower surpassing the Empire State Building in New York City, which turned out impossible due to funding constraints); with this height it is just 13 meters taller than its Parisian source of inspiration. It is still the second tallest free-standing structure in Japan; in fact it surrendered the crown just recently in 2010 to a newer communications tower built in Tokyo dubbed the Tokyo Skytree.

The history of the tower is not uncommon, yet interesting. The newly-industrialized nation of Japan was in need of both infrastructure to support growth and icons to boost its image in the world in the late 1950s. As part of this infrastructure undertaking, a broadcasting tower was devised by the government that would transmit television and radio signals to the Tokyo region. In fact, the city of Tokyo already had a communications tower at the time built by the public broadcaster NHK, but the proliferation of private TV and radio stations meant that more of these structures would be needed, scattered throughout the city and resulting in a cluttered skyline. Hence, the Japanese government's purpose in rushing in the boradcasting tower project was two-pronged: To show-off the power of Japan, and to provide a solution to the needs of multiple broadcasting stations.

The tower was designed by Tachu Naito, who was inspired by the Eiffel Tower strongly. It was built by the Takenaka Corporation, which employed hundreds of Japanese highrise construction workers (called tobi) to complete the task at hand. Ground-breaking took place in June 1957, and the entire structure was completed before the end of 1958, thanks to the use of steel instead of concrete during construction. An interesting factoid to note is that a third of the steel used during the construction was recycled from scrapped US tanks from the Korean War. Use of steel also helped the tower measure almost half the weight of the Eiffel at 4000 tons versus 7300 tons, which had been built of iron instead of steel. Regardless, it is claimed to withstand eartquakes with magnitude 9.0 and winds of up to 220 kilometers per hour.


Although a broadcasting tower, the structure has also brought in significant tourism revenue. Since its opening, it has been visited by more than 150 million people, who climbed to its two observation decks at 150 meters and 250 meters respectively. Although the visitorship has declined gradually to a bottom value of around 2 million per year in 2000, it has since picked up and currently stands close to 3 million visitors annually.


Perhaps what make the Tokyo Tower a sight to see are its illumination schemes. Before 1987, the tower had been illuminated by plain light bulbs placed throughout its lattice structure. Coinciding with the tower's 30th anniversary, a newer lighting system was designed to attract more visitors to the tower. A total of 176 floodlights were installed to the tower, which illuminate the tower from dusk to midnight everyday.

The illumination depends on the season, occasion and even endorsement. During fall, winter and spring months orange lighting is used to improve the mood of the people of Tokyo in colder months, whereas in summer white is used to induce the feeling of coolness in people. Breast Cancer Awareness Month is acknowledged by pink color at the beginning of October, and both Christmas and New Year's Ever are recognized by special schemes. Even St. Patrick's Day and Coca Cola and Matrix Reloaded made their way to the tower on special occasions. The tower's observation deck windows are also used as primitive tool for displaying texts, which was used dur,ng Tokyo's bid for the 2016 Summer Olympic Games.

As with most title holders, Tokyo Tower relinquished its crown, as mentioned before, to Tokyo Skytree in 2010. This was due to the fact that the tower's height was not sufficient for terrestrial digital broadcasting that has been rolled-out globally in the last decade. Tokyo Skytree dwarfs Tokyo Tower with its 634 meter height; in fact it currently is the second tallest structure in the world after Burj Khalifa in Dubai. Still, the tower continues to function as a broadcasting tower. It also continues to shine, illuminate and dazzle Tokyoites and foreigners alike with its colors.

Holiest of Holies - Harmandir Sahib

Sikhism is but one of many religions of the Indian subcontinent. It competes with a multitude of others for the hearts and minds of believers, including the mighty Hinduism and Islam, as well as Indian Buddhism, Jainism and Christianity brought over by colonial forces. It is a religion followed by approximately 1.5 per cent of all Indians, amounting to more than 21 million believers. Over 2 million more observe the rituals of Sikhism elsewhere; however the numbers do not lie: Sikhism is an Indian religion. Specifically, it is a Punjabi religion, as the largest concentration of Sikhs in India is in this state - along with neighboring Punjab in Pakistan - although they can be found in most states of India.

As a result of this concentration of its believers, it is only natural that Sikhism has left its greatest mark in this part of the world, in the form of temples and houses of worship. And that it has done, more so than antything else, in the form of gurdwaras.

A gurdwara (from Punjabi for gateway to the guru) is a house of worship for Sikhs, although followers of all faiths are welcome to gurdwaras. A temple can be deemed to be a gurdwara in Sikhism if the Guru Granth Sahib - the 1430 page-long central religious scripture of Sikhism compiled during the late 15th century - is maintained within the main hall of the temple (called the Darbar Sahib) on a throne in a prominent position. Once announced as a gurdwara, the temple becomes a holy place for Sikhs to converge to and pray.

Most gurdwaras are elaborately decorated, striking buildings that demonstrate the value given to the Guru Granth Sahib by Sikhs; they are heavily ornamented, and they often are built of materials of great value, such as gold. As such, most gurdwaras are structures that appeal to the eyes of believers of all religions alike. And no other example of these temples comes close to the sheer beauty of one that sits in the middle of a pool in the city of Amritsar in Punjab: the Harmandir Sahib.

Harmandir Sahib (literally Temple of God), also known informally as the Golden Temple, is one of many gurdwaras in India. But it is easily the most well-known of all Sikh temples. Built in the 16th century by the fifth Sikh guru, Guru Arjun Dev Ji, its holy scripture was installed in 1604. But the idea of a temple at this location was first conceived after the fourth guru, Guru Ram Das, excavated a pool in the area between 1570 and 1577 on land purchased by earlier gurus. The pool subsequently became known as Amritsar - "pool of the nectar of immortality" - and the city with the same name grew around it at about the same time. Later, the temple itself was built to house the holy scriptures of Sikhism, and hence Sri Harmandir Sahib (the temple, or abode, of God) was born.

Guru Arjan Dev Ji himself designed the building after he came up with the idea of a central house of worship for the Sikhs, and the construction began in earnest in 1588 under his supervision. After it was completed in 1604, Guru Arjan appointed Baba Buddha as the first reader to the temple and the place of worship was ready for its visitors.

The temple is built on a pedestal in the middle of a pool - or holy tank - known as the sarovar, which consists of Amrit (holy water or immortal nectar; hence the name Amritsar) and is fed by the river Ravi. The temple itself is in fact built on lower ground compared to the surroundings, although it is in the middle of the sarovar, so that followers will have to go down rather than climb up when going in to pray.

There are four entrances to the temple on each one of the facades of the building, signifying the iimportance of openness in Sikhism. This means that people of all races, sexes, religions are welcome at the Harmandir Sahib, as long as they obey three principles:

• Purity - removing shoes and not consuming alcohol, cigarettes, drugs or meat inside
• Modesty - dressing appropriately
• Respect - sitting on the ground while there is a religious procession

The gilding, along with majority of the marblework, dates to the early 19th century works overseen by Maharaja Ranjit Singh. Inside the temple itself one can see plaques conmemorating Sikh historical events, saints and martyrs, and outside the temple but within the complex of the gurdwara, shrines to gurus and saints can be found.

The temple suffered significant damage due to Afghan attacks in 1760, and it had to be rebuilt in 1764 by Jassa Singh Ahluwalia with help from other Sikh Misls (any one of the twellve sovereign states in the Sikh Confederacy). Most of the structure that remains today dates to this period, although the gilding on the upper floors are from the early 19th century as mentioned before.

A much more recent case of trouble was brought upon the temple by none other than Indira Gandhi, daughter of Rajiv Gandhi, who initiated Operation Blue Star at the temple in order to put an end to Dharam Yudh Morcha - an opposition group with demands for more rights for the Sikh inhabitants of the region. The operation brought tanks and artillery to the temple and resulted in widepread protests and arrests, and it eventually led to the assasination of Gandhi by her Sikh bodyguards. In the fighting that ensued, many people were killed and the temple suffered significant damage that took decades to fully repair.

All religions have left behind a trail of destruction and pain to some extent. They are one of the main causes of strife among peoples, and still lead to wars around the world. But they have also left behind some of the most elegant works of architecture and helped architecture become what it is today. Harmandir Sahib is no exception, and it is proof that, yes, some that glitters is gold.