Today is the last day to visit the Centre Pompidou before it closes for five years for renovations. Designed in the 1970s by two young, unknown architects — the Italian Renzo Piano and the British Richard Rogers — it officially opened on 31 January 1977.
And it was a shock! “Paris has its own monster, just like the one in Loch Ness,” said the French magazine Le Figaro. “Notre Dame des Tuyaux,” “Centre Mochebourg,” and “oil refinery” were some of the nicknames, but in the end it became a popular success, with more than 200 million visitors since 1977.
And it was a shock for me too, the first time I visited Paris. It was night, the piazza was deserted, and I saw what looked like an alien spaceship that had landed in the heart of the city. Was I living in a sci-fi movie?
Today I still love this radical and futuristic architecture.
I love the lightness, the transparency, the sense of seeing through it — I find it so elegant and so sexy!
Inside, I love the bright, open, expansive spaces, the feeling of being inside the building but, at the same time, still within the city. And I love spending hours in the bookstore looking for a new book.
Outside, I love all those tubes and pipes. I love the bold colours used as symbols: blue for air conditioning, yellow for electricity, green for water, and red for pedestrian circulation.
I love the periscope-like giant air vents of an imaginary transatlantic space liner. I love the red zigzag, and I love the unique view of Paris from the 5th floor.
I am sure that the next time I am in Paris, I will miss you!
Photo: Antonello Tabarelli de Fatis