What color is the tower in real life?
The Eiffel Tower has been painted in a number of different colors throughout its history, but today, it is painted a color called “Eiffel Tower beige,” which turns out to be the color of milk chocolate, and it is used in three very slightly different shades at different elevations of the tower (higher elevations use a lighter shade), in order to accentuate the impression of height. The paint is synthetic and silicone-based, and the entire structure is repainted over a period of 6-7 years by several dozen fearless and highly acrobatic painters, by hand (no automated way of painting the tower has ever been satisfactory). The most recent repainting operation (the eighteenth) began in 2001 and required two years. See my photograph of the waiting line at the base of the tower for a good view of its actual color. In the late afternoon and around sunset, the redness of the sunlight makes the tower look somewhat orange (see my main photograph of the tower for an example). At night, the tower i
