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September 4, 2007 7:16 AM PDT

Next 'Great Pyramid' made in Germany?

by Candace Lombardi
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Great Pyramid of Germany

Image of proposed Great Pyramid of Germany

(Credit: Friends of the Great Pyramid)
Great Pyramid of Germany comparison chart

Germany's pyramid would be 10 times larger than the Great Pyramid of Egypt.

(Credit: Friends of the Great Pyramid)

A group in Dessau, Germany, has received funds and famed architect Rem Koolhaas as an adviser in its quest to build the world's largest structure.

Dubbed a "monument for all of us" the new "Great Pyramid," which is estimated would take about 30 years to complete, would be about 1,900 feet tall and 10 times larger than the Great Pyramid of Egypt, according to the Great Pyramid's Web site.

Instead of being a monument to only a few individuals, Germany's Great Pyramid would be a communal tomb open to anyone regardless of nationality or denomination. It would offer burial space in the form of a "tomb container with ashes of the deceased" and engraved "memorial stones" with time capsules to store personal memorabilia.

A burial spot will cost about $960 (700 euros), Jens Thiel, an economist and one of the Friends of the Great Pyramid leaders, told U.K. construction magazine Building .

On Sunday, the group presented a stone prototype of the Great Pyramid at a Great Pyramid Festival in Streetz, a small village north of Dessau.

Pritzker-winning Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas is set to lead the jury for choosing a final design for the project, according to several reports. Students under Heiko Holzberger at Weimar Bauhaus University in Germany conducted a technology feasibility study that concluded the project is viable, according to the Great Pyramid Web site.

The project has been given starter funding by the "Future of Labor" program of the government-backed German Federal Cultural Foundation.

As part of the group's business plan, the structure would be built up and out incrementally so that stones are added only as people buy placement in the pyramid.

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