Jeremy Gutsche
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 'Worst Building in the History of Mankind' to Resume Construction The ‘Hotel of Doom’ is an iconic, desolate ghost building nestled in the hear of North Korea. Actually called the Ryugyong Hotel, the building is affectionately known as the ‘Hotel of Doom’ because it has never been occupied. The 105 story pyramid, which dominates the skyline, was never actually completed. After the collapse of the the Soviet Union, the project lost its funding. There has been no construction since 1992. These photos from Wikipedia and SkyscraperLife show the hotel as an ominous, daunting presence. This week, the hotel is back in the news. Specifically, Egypt’s Orascom Group has resumed construction. To begin, they have started refurbishing the top three floors. No official next steps have been released, although architects assume it would cost up to $2 billion to make the building habitable. For some lovely context, the hotel was dubbed by Esquire Magazine as ‘The Worst Building in the History of Mankind’, further noting, “Even by Communist standards, the 3,000-room hotel is hideously ugly.”  A picture doesn't lie -- the one-hundred-and-five-story Ryugyong Hotel is hideous, dominating the Pyongyang skyline like some twisted North Korean version of Cinderella's castle. Not that you would be able to tell from the official government photos of the North Korean capital -- the hotel is such an eyesore, the Communist regime routinely covers it up, airbrushing it to make it look like it's open -- or Photoshopping or cropping it out of pictures completely.
(ryugyong.org)References: ryugyong.org, esquire Comment: on Hotel of Doom |
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Urban Retrospectives
