Dizzying Spiral Staircase with Single Guardrail Once Led to Top of Eiffel Tower

A little piece of vertigo heads to auction

A section of the narrow, 19th-century spiral staircase that once climbed from the Eiffel Tower’s second floor to Gustave Eiffel’s private office is going under the hammer. It has been reported that the French auction house Artcurial will offer the lot — reportedly 14 original steps — on May 21, with estimates between about $141,000 and $176,000. “Imagine yourself in 1889 on this staircase, perched between [371 and 906 feet] high, with no safety barriers,” Sabrina Dolla of Artcurial told CNN. Chills, anyone?

A slice of original ironwork

The stairs were part of the tower built for the 1889 World’s Fair, a structure that famously divided opinion — one critic called it a “truly tragic street lamp.” The spiral between the second and third levels measured 1,062 steps in total and featured a single guardrail; elevators ran from opening day, but this hair-raising climb reportedly took you to Eiffel’s private 1,076-square-foot office, where visitors signed his Golden Book and luminaries like Buffalo Bill and Thomas Edison were entertained. Artcurial says the stair segment was open to visitors; other sources, however, allege that parts of the highest spiral were off-limits to the public.

From industrial relic to collectible

Fragments of the original ironwork have been scattered to museums and private collections for decades, and it has been reported that smaller pieces even made their way into the medals handed out at the 2024 Paris Olympics. The auction is a reminder that architectural salvage can fetch eye-watering sums — and that the Eiffel Tower, once destined for demolition after 20 years, is now a global icon and a source of collectible relics.

Why this still matters

There’s an emotional tug to owning a sliver of a landmark — a physical link to a moment when Paris was reinventing itself and engineering felt like magic. Would you hang a slice of that dizzying spiral on your wall? It’s history, with a bit of vertigo and a price tag attached.

Sources: smithsonianmag.com, Hacker News