by Grace Ng

With curiosity and awe of great beauty being an innate part of human nature, surely there is a desire in everyone to see the Seven Wonders of the World, a list comprising of man-made marvels and natural landscapes.

Through an “American Idol” voting style, the The Ancient Seven Wonders of the World – the Great Pyramid of Giza, Hanging Gardens of Babylon, Statue of Zeus at Olympia, Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, Mausoleum of Maussollos at Halicarnassus, Colossus of Rhodes, and the Lighthouse of Alexandria – had six of them destroyed due to human acts, such as arsons, and natural disasters such as earthquakes.

The Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt is the only survivor from the Ancient list, but sadly, it did not receive sufficient votes from the public to become one of the Seven Wonders during last year’s poll organized by the New7Wonders Foundation. It was, however, one of the finalists along with the Eiffel Tower in Paris, Sydney Opera House in Sydney and the Statue of Liberty in New York among others.

A search on the Internet yields endless other lists of Wonders that have been generated over the years by various sources, which shows that wonders never cease, especially with the increasing phenomenon of spectacular architecture that never fail to make the global audience gasp with exhilaration, such as Zaha Hadid’s BMW Central Building in Leipzig, Germany and the new Beijing Olympic Stadium in China, also known as the “Bird’s Nest”, a collaboration of Herzog & de Meuron, Arupsport and China Architecture Design & Research Group (CAG). At the same time, with the lists of Seven Wonders generated in proliferation, it is evident that the growing number of man-made marvels has confused the public on what exactly the Wonders of the World are.

After reading The Seven Newest Wonders of the World in the April/May issue of Discovery Channel Magazine, which featured The Millau Viaduct Bridge in Millau, Tibet Sky Train in Tibet, the city of Dubai, United Arab Emirates, the Bilbao Guggenheim in Spain, the Three Gorges Dam in China, wildlife Eden in Gabon, Africa, and the Hubble Space Telescope in outerspace, it made me wonder, how then, does this new list of Seven Wonders live up to the public’s expectations and fill in the gargantuan shoes left by their predecessors?

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GRACE NG
Writer
TAXI Design Network

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