The Louvre Inverted Pyramid (French : Pyramide inversée du Louvre) [1] is a skylight constructed in the Carrousel du Louvre, an underground shopping mall in front of the Louvre Museum in France. It may be thought of as a smaller sibling of the more famous Louvre Pyramid proper, yet turned upside down: its upturned base is easily seen from outside.
The inverted pyramid marks the intersection of two main underground walkways beneath the Place du Carrousel and orients visitors towards the museum entrance under the Cour Napoléon. Tensioned against a 30-tonne (33-short-ton), 13.3-metre (44 ft) square steel caisson frame, the inverted pyramidal shape in laminated glass points downward towards the floor. The glass of the pyramid itself is 10 millimetres (0.39 in) thick, while the glass above the pyramid at courtyard (ground) level, which must be able to support the weight of pedestrians, is 30 millimetres (1.2 in) thick. [2] The tip of the pyramid is suspended 1.4 metres (4.6 ft) above floor level. Individual glass panes in the pyramid are connected by stainless-steel crosses 381 millimetres (15.0 in) in length. After dark, the structure is illuminated by a frieze of spotlights.
Directly below the tip of the downwards-pointing glass pyramid, a small stone pyramid (about 1 m, 3.3 ft) is stationed on the floor, as if mirroring the larger structure above: The tips of the two pyramids almost touch. [3]
The Pyramide Inversée was designed by architect I.M. Pei, and installed as part of the Phase II government renovation of the Louvre Museum, known as the Grand Louvre project. It was completed in 1993. [1] In 1995, it was a finalist in the Benedictus Awards, described by the jury as "a remarkable anti-structure ... a symbolic use of technology ... a piece of sculpture. It was meant as an object but it is an object to transmit light." [4]
The Inverted Pyramid figures prominently on the concluding pages of Dan Brown's international bestseller The Da Vinci Code . The protagonist of the 2003 novel, Robert Langdon, reads esoteric symbolism into the two pyramids: The Inverted Pyramid is perceived as a Chalice, a feminine symbol, whereas the stone pyramid below is interpreted as a Blade, a masculine symbol: the whole structure could thus express the union of the sexes. Moreover, Brown's protagonist concludes that the tiny stone pyramid is actually only the apex of a larger pyramid (possibly the same size as the inverted pyramid above), embedded in the floor as a secret chamber. This chamber is implied to enclose the body of Mary Magdalene.
At the climax of the 2006 film adaptation, the camera elaborately moves through the entire glass pyramid from above and then descends beneath the floor below to reveal the supposed hidden chamber under the tiny stone pyramid, containing the sarcophagus with the remains of Mary Magdalene.
In reality, the smaller stone pyramid does not form the tip of a larger pyramid. In fact, it can be pushed aside to facilitate maintenance and cleaning of the glass pyramid above.
The Great Pyramid of Giza is the largest Egyptian pyramid. It served as the tomb of pharaoh Khufu, who ruled during the Fourth Dynasty of the Old Kingdom. Built c. 2600 BC, over a period of about 26 years, the pyramid is the oldest of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, and the only wonder that has remained largely intact. It is the most famous monument of the Giza pyramid complex, which is part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site "Memphis and its Necropolis". It is situated at the northeastern end of the line of the three main pyramids at Giza.
The Louvre, or the Louvre Museum, is a national art museum in Paris, France, and one of the most famous museums in the world. It is located on the Right Bank of the Seine in the city's 1st arrondissement and home to some of the most canonical works of Western art, including the Mona Lisa,Venus de Milo, and Winged Victory. The museum is housed in the Louvre Palace, originally built in the late 12th to 13th century under Philip II. Remnants of the Medieval Louvre fortress are visible in the basement of the museum. Due to urban expansion, the fortress eventually lost its defensive function, and in 1546 Francis I converted it into the primary residence of the French kings.
A pyramid is a structure whose visible surfaces are triangular in broad outline and converge toward the top, making the appearance roughly a pyramid in the geometric sense. The base of a pyramid can be of any polygon shape, such as triangular or quadrilateral, and its lines either filled or stepped.
Palais Royal–Musée du Louvre is a station on Line 1 and Line 7 of the Paris Métro. Situated in the heart of the 1st arrondissement, it most notably serves the Palais-Royal, Comédie-Française and Louvre.
The Tuileries Palace was a royal and imperial palace in Paris which stood on the right bank of the Seine, directly in the west-front of the Louvre Palace. It was the Parisian residence of most French monarchs, from Henry IV to Napoleon III, until it was burned by the Paris Commune in 1871.
The National Diet Building is the building where both houses of the National Diet of Japan meet. It is located at Nagatachō 1-chome 7–1, Chiyoda, Tokyo.
The Layer Pyramid is a ruined step pyramid dating to the 3rd Dynasty of Egypt and located in the necropolis of Zawyet El Aryan. Its ownership is uncertain and may be attributable to king Khaba. The pyramid architecture, however, is very similar to that of the Buried Pyramid of king Sekhemkhet and for this reason is firmly datable to the 3rd Dynasty.
The Louvre Pyramid is a large glass-and-metal structure designed by the Chinese-American architect I. M. Pei. The pyramid is in the main courtyard of the Louvre Palace in Paris, surrounded by three smaller pyramids. The large pyramid serves as the main entrance to the Louvre Museum, allowing light to the underground visitors hall, while also allowing sight lines of the palace to visitors in the hall, and through access galleries to the different wings of the palace. Completed in 1989 as part of the broader Grand Louvre project, it has become a landmark of Paris.
The Da Vinci Code is a 2003 mystery thriller novel by Dan Brown. It is Brown's second novel to include the character Robert Langdon: the first was his 2000 novel Angels & Demons. The Da Vinci Code follows symbologist Langdon and cryptologist Sophie Neveu after a murder in the Louvre Museum in Paris entangles them in a dispute between the Priory of Sion and Opus Dei over the possibility of Jesus and Mary Magdalene having had a child together.
The Louvre Palace, often referred to simply as the Louvre, is an iconic French palace located on the Right Bank of the Seine in Paris, occupying a vast expanse of land between the Tuileries Gardens and the church of Saint-Germain l'Auxerrois. Originally a defensive castle, it has served several government-related functions in the past, including intermittently as a royal residence between the 14th and 18th centuries. It is now mostly used by the Louvre Museum, which first opened there in 1793.
The Carrousel du Louvre is an underground shopping mall in the 1st arrondissement of Paris, France, managed by Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield. The name refers to two nearby sites, the Louvre museum and the Place du Carrousel. The mall contains a famous skylight, La Pyramide Inversée, which plays an important role in the best-selling 2003 book The Da Vinci Code.
The Pont du Carrousel is a bridge in Paris, which spans the River Seine between the Quai des Tuileries and the Quai Voltaire.
The Pavillon de Flore, part of the Louvre Palace in Paris, France, stands at the southwest end of the Louvre, near the Pont Royal. It was originally constructed in 1607–1610, during the reign of Henry IV, as the corner pavilion between the Tuileries Palace to the north and the Louvre's Grande Galerie to the east. The pavilion was entirely redesigned and rebuilt by Hector-Martin Lefuel in 1864–1868 in a highly decorated Second Empire style. Arguably the most famous sculpture on the exterior of the Louvre, Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux's Triumph of Flora, was added below the central pediment of the south façade at this time. The Tuileries Palace was burned by the Paris Commune in 1871, and a north façade, similar to the south façade, was added to the pavilion by Lefuel in 1874–1879. Currently, the Pavillon de Flore is part of the Louvre Museum.
The Pavillon de l’Horloge, also known as the Pavillon Sully, is a prominent architectural structure located in the center of the western wing of the Cour Carrée of the Louvre Palace in Paris. Since the late 19th century, the name Pavillon de l'Horloge has generally been applied to the structure's eastern face, which dates from the 17th century, and the name Pavillon Sully to its western face, which was redecorated in the 1850s as part of Napoleon III's Louvre expansion.
The Tomb of Akhethetep, also known as Mastaba of Akhethetep, is a tomb complex in Saqqarah, Egypt. It was built for Akhethetep, a royal official, near the western part of the Pyramid of Djoser. Akhethetep was an official with several, mainly religious titles. including priest of Heka, priest of Khnum and priest of Horus. The tomb's decorated chapel was removed in 1903 and reassembled at the Louvre in Paris, where it is also known as the "Mastaba of Akhethetep" or simply "le mastaba du Louvre".
Pyramid G1-d is a satellite pyramid within the Khufu pyramid complex on the Giza plateau.
In architecture, an inverted pyramid is a structure in the shape of an upside-down pyramid.
The Southern South Saqqara Pyramid is an ancient Egyptian royal tomb which was built during the 13th Dynasty in South Saqqara, and is renowned for having the most elaborate hypogeum since the late 12th Dynasty pyramids. The building remains unfinished and its owner is still uncertain as no unambiguous evidence has been found to settle the issue. In 2008, the Egyptologist Christoffer Theis proposed that the pyramid was built for king Djehuti, based on an inscription discovered nearby by Gustave Jéquier.
The Grand Louvre refers to the decade-long project initiated by French President François Mitterrand in 1981 of expanding and remodeling the Louvre – both the building and the museum – by moving the French Finance Ministry, which had been located in the Louvre's northern wing since 1871, to a different location. The centerpiece of the Grand Louvre is the Louvre Pyramid designed by Chinese-American architect I. M. Pei, which was also the project's most controversial component. The Grand Louvre was substantially completed in the late 1990s, even though its last elements were only finalized in the 2010s.
The expansion of the Louvre under Napoleon III in the 1850s, known at the time and until the 1980s as the Nouveau Louvre or Louvre de Napoléon III, was an iconic project of the Second French Empire and a centerpiece of its ambitious transformation of Paris. Its design was initially produced by Louis Visconti and, after Visconti's death in late 1853, modified and executed by Hector-Martin Lefuel. It represented the completion of a centuries-long project, sometimes referred to as the grand dessein, to connect the old Louvre Palace around the Cour Carrée with the Tuileries Palace to the west. Following the Tuileries' arson at the end of the Paris Commune in 1871 and demolition a decade later, Napoleon III's nouveau Louvre became the eastern end of Paris's axe historique centered on the Champs-Élysées.
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