Eccentric Wooden Tower

Posted by on December 31st,2006

Wooden tower of Arkhangelsk

Ok, both the Table of Malcontents and Neatorama had this, and I couldn’t resist any longer – it’s the wooden ‘skyscraper’ of the town of Arkhangelsk in Russia, and it’s handmade by one resident of that town to rise about 10 storeys above the height of the rest of the towns two storey skyline. The officials want to pull it down, but the owner (and many of the residents in the town) like it. I certainly like it – it looks like something from a Victorian horror story, or where an obsessive compulsive Steampunk inventor would house his/her many inventions as floorspace became troublesome. We all know how it is – you try putting shelves up, but eventually you run out of walls…

I do love it though – despite the impracticallity of it. Looming out of the mist like something imagined in a black and white film, they could probably charge for tourists to visit. Very evocative name for the town too – is it, as I suspect, Russian for archangel?