Chinese city with French charm: Tianducheng - "little Paris" made in China

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

When at the beginning of the 20th century Mayakovsky joked: "The tower is scary in Paris", he could not even imagine that the day would come when the Eiffel Tower could be seen not only in France, but also in other parts of the world. In the comic poem "Read and go to Paris and China," he turned out to be almost a prophet, combining these two place names in one route. It turns out that in the resort Tianducheng city (a suburb of the Chinese city of Hangzhou) really has its own "Little Paris" … By the way, in addition to the tower, you can find here other "copies" of French landmarks - the Arc de Triomphe, the Versailles Park and a whole block of residential buildings built in the European style.

The idea to create a “little Paris” in China arose in 2007, when the country was experiencing a construction “boom”: this large-scale project could attract foreign investors and positively affect the growth of GDP in the country. Note that almost simultaneously with the city of Tianducheng, other cities resembling European ones were built. This is how the English city Thames Town and the Austrian village of Gelstatt appeared in the Middle Kingdom, which we have already written about earlier on our website Culturology.ru.

It took five years of painstaking work to create a town with a French charm. Presumably, up to 10 thousand people can live in Tianducheng, along with tourist services, there is a well-developed household infrastructure - there is a school, a hospital and, of course, a club. Newlyweds in China often travel to Europe, now they have the opportunity to visit Paris without leaving their country. It's hard to imagine a more romantic honeymoon destination. Everyone has the opportunity to take a souvenir photo at the Eiffel Tower, by the way, its dimensions, although inferior to the original, are still quite impressive: the tower rises 108 m above the city (this is three times less than the height of the Eiffel Tower).

However, despite the fact that Tianducheng really became a decoration of China, it still remains practically a ghost town, since there are very few people permanently living here. Accommodation in the city is very expensive and few people can afford such a luxury. Today, tourists or newlyweds most often come to "little Paris", because the charm of this city does not hold.