ARLA/CLUSTER: Russia pertende demolir torre de radiodifusão Shukhov em Moscovo

[João Costa > CT1FBF]

Shukhov Tower: The Eiffel of the East

The proposed demolition of a rusting Soviet radio tower in Moscow has
ignited a passionate, international conservation campaign. Why?

The slender, steel frame of the Shabolovka Tower rises above the
rooftops of Moscow. At 160m (525ft) high, it is a single exclamation
mark in an otherwise dense urban landscape. Its filigree design gives
it a delicate and ephemeral quality, but the radio tower has been a
fixture of the skyline since 1922.

Commissioned by Lenin in 1919, the tower is commonly referred to as
the Shukhov Tower after its designer - leading engineer Vladimir
Shukhov, whose pioneering architectural vision first brought news of
the modern world to the Soviet people.

"Communication and radio was the new thing, the latest technology at
the time. Shukhov's tower was spreading the word of the new age," says
Richard Pare, who first photographed the tower in 1993.

"It is a transcendent structure. The sensation of standing underneath
it is so uplifting, it makes you feel weightless. It soars upwards."

Pare is the co-author of an open letter to President Vladimir Putin,
signed by a number of renowned architects, urging that the tower be
preserved. But in February, Russia's State Committee for Television
and Radio Broadcasting declared the structure unsound and proposed to
dismantle it. Campaigners now await an official decision.

"In terms of its engineering, its symbolic significance, the urban
landscape - it would be such a catastrophic loss," Pare says.

Read the full BBC News story, with pictures, at:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-26876243