The Eiffel Tower is set to undergo a major three-year makeover and could be about to shed its brown colour and instead dazzle visitors with a new, brighter coat of paint.
It might be hard to imagine but at the request of its designer Gustave Eiffel, the tower was painted red due to the colour’s rust fighting capabilities when it was first erected in 1889. In 1892, it was painted an equally hard to imagine ochre – a light shade of orange, according to The Local.
And it didn’t stop there.
In 1899, things really got creative when the monument was painted an orange yellow at its base and light yellow at the top. And from 1907 to 1954, it was a yellow brown colour before it was painted brown red in 1968.
Today, the Iron Lady is painted a specially designed shade of brown and it hasn’t yet been decided whether the monument will definitely be given a bright makeover.
It will take 60 tons of paint to cover Paris’s Iron Lady. Painting will begin in October and is likely to last three years as part of a longer project.
