Witch’s hat highrise to loom over Paris

Swiss architects Herzog and de Meuron will build a 200-metre-high office tower in Paris, the first skyscraper to go up in the French capital in three decades.

The pyramid-like glass building is part of a controversial decision by the socialist French mayor, Bertrand Delanoë, to construct several towers on the edge of Paris.

Making the announcement on Thursday, Delanoë called the Herzog and de Meuron plans “exceptional”.

To be built in the southwest of Paris, the Triangle Project will be the first skyscraper constructed in the city since the 210-metre-high Montparnasse Tower went up in the 1970s.

The Swiss-designed structure will have office space for 5,000 people and Delanoë said it would adhere to Paris’s strict environmental building codes. The initial plan foresees it running on wind and solar energy.

The announcement comes only two months after the city council launched a study to permit the construction of buildings higher than the current limit of 37 metres.

The Greens and other environmentalists are opposed to a lifting of the restriction.