Eiffel Tower made of 700,000 matches: Guinness rejects record attempt

Model maker disappointed
Man spends eight years building the Eiffel Tower using 700,000 matches – but his record is rejected

A Frenchman painstakingly processed more than 700,000 matches into an Eiffel Tower. It took the model maker eight years to do this and hoped for an entry in the Guinness Book of Records. But the judges rejected the construction – because he used the wrong matches.

It was a bitter setback for Richard Paul. The model maker from the small French community of Montpellier-de-Médillan spent eight years of his life and 4,200 hours creating a replica of the Building the Eiffel Tower.

He put together the 7.19 meter high structure from a total of 706,900 matchsticks. He used 23 kilograms of glue for his work of art. But the British judges of the Guinness Book did not recognize the record – because the matches were not commercially available.

Because the 47-year-old didn’t feel like cutting off the heads individually, he contacted the largest French manufacturer to have the wooden sticks delivered in 15 kilogram boxes.

However, according to Guinness guidelines, he should not have cut, disassembled, or distorted the shape of the matchsticks as a matchstick. He should have scraped off the flammable red end and not cut it off. However, he only found out about this subtlety of the regulations in October last year. But by then it was already too late: After all, he had made sure that he completed his work on December 27, 2023, the 100th anniversary of Gustave Eiffel’s death.

The record holder for the largest Eiffel Tower made of matchsticks is a Lebanese man

“This is disappointing, frustrating, incomprehensible and not very fair,” he told the daily newspaper Le Parisien. He also vented his anger on Facebook and complained that the Guinness Book judges had made their verdict without even looking at the tower.

Now the Frenchman wants to at least exhibit his project at the Olympic Games in Paris. The organizing committee had already spoken out in favor of it. However, there would be a problem. “They told me there wasn’t a hall high enough to hold it,” Plaud said.

By the way, the record for the tallest Eiffel Tower replica made from matches is held by the Lebanese Toufic Daher. The 6.53 meter high model was unveiled on November 11, 2009 at the City Mall in Beirut, Lebanon, on the occasion of Guinness World Records Day.

Watch the video above: Two minus four equals eight – something is wrong with this equation. To get a correct equation, you can only move one of the matches. Can you solve the puzzle in just ten seconds?

Sources: Facebook, Le Parisien, guinnessworldrecords.com