Iconic buildings of the world

Where

Giza, on the edge of Cairo, Egypt

When

The Great Pyramid about 2560 BCE

Who

Built for the pharaohs Khufu (Cheops), Khafre and Menkaure

Made with

Millions of limestone blocks, once faced with smooth white limestone

The three big pyramids are tombs for three kings of Egypt's Fourth Dynasty. The largest, the Great Pyramid of Khufu, was about 146.6 metres tall when finished, and it stayed the tallest structure built by humans for about 3,800 years, until the spire of Lincoln Cathedral in England passed it in 1311. Its smooth white outer casing was later taken away for building stone, so it is now about 138.5 metres. It is the oldest of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World and the only one still standing.

Where

The Acropolis, Athens, Greece

When

447 to 432 BCE

Who

Architects Ictinus and Callicrates, with the sculptor Phidias in charge of the carvings

Style

Classical Greek, Doric order

Made with

White marble

A temple to the goddess Athena, built when Athens was at the height of its power. It is the finest example of the Doric order, the plainest of the three Greek column styles. Later it became a church, then a mosque, and in 1687 gunpowder stored inside exploded and blew out its middle. Many of its carvings were taken to Britain in the early 1800s and are now in the British Museum, where they are called the Elgin Marbles.

Where

Rome, Italy

When

Begun about 72 CE; opened 80 CE

Who

The emperors Vespasian and his son Titus

Style

Ancient Roman

Made with

Travertine stone, volcanic tuff, brick and Roman concrete

The largest amphitheatre the Romans ever built. It held an estimated 50,000 to 80,000 people, who came to watch gladiators fight, animal hunts and public shows. The Romans' great inventions, the round arch and concrete, let them build huge, many-storeyed buildings like this. Earthquakes and people taking its stone for other buildings ruined part of it, but its oval of stacked arches is still the symbol of ancient Rome.

Where

Istanbul (once Constantinople), Turkey

When

532 to 537 CE

Who

Emperor Justinian I; designed by Anthemius of Tralles and Isidore of Miletus

Style

Byzantine

Made with

Brick and stone, with marble and gold mosaics inside

Built as the great church of the Byzantine Empire, it had the largest interior space in the world when it was finished. Its huge dome sits on pendentives: four curved triangles that let a round dome rest on a square of four arches. After the Ottomans took the city in 1453 it became a mosque, and minarets were added. It became a museum in 1935 and a mosque again in 2020.

Where

Siem Reap, Cambodia

When

About 1113 to 1150 CE

Who

The Khmer king Suryavarman II

Style

Khmer

Made with

Sandstone, carved all over with reliefs

The largest religious monument in the world. It was built as a Hindu temple for the god Vishnu and slowly became a Buddhist temple from the late 13th century. Its five central towers stand for the peaks of Mount Meru, the mountain at the centre of the universe in Hindu and Buddhist belief, and the wide moat around it stands for the ocean. It appears on the national flag of Cambodia.

Where

Île de la Cité, an island in the river Seine, Paris, France

When

Begun 1163; largely finished by 1260

Style

Gothic

Made with

Limestone, with stained glass and a wooden roof covered in lead

Notre-Dame is one of the great Gothic cathedrals. Gothic builders used pointed arches, rib vaults and flying buttresses, stone arms on the outside that push in against the walls, so the walls could be thinner and filled with huge stained-glass windows such as its round rose windows. On 15 April 2019 a fire destroyed its wooden roof and its 19th-century spire, which you can see in this 2017 photo. After more than five years of repair, it reopened on 7 December 2024.

Where

Beijing, China

When

Built 1406 to 1420

Who

The Yongle Emperor of the Ming dynasty

Style

Traditional Chinese palace architecture

Made with

Wood, with glazed yellow roof tiles, on stone platforms inside red walls

The imperial palace of China for about 500 years, home to 24 emperors of the Ming and Qing dynasties. Ordinary people could not enter without permission, which is where its name comes from. It is the largest old palace complex still standing in the world, surrounded by a moat and high walls. Since 1925 it has been the Palace Museum, and it became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1987.

Where

Champ de Mars, Paris, France

When

1887 to 1889

Who

Gustave Eiffel's company; engineers Maurice Koechlin and Émile Nouguier, architect Stephen Sauvestre

Made with

Wrought iron, about 18,000 parts joined by 2.5 million rivets

Built as the centrepiece of the 1889 World's Fair in Paris, a hundred years after the French Revolution. Some of France's leading artists attacked it at first, but it became the symbol of Paris. It was 300 metres tall, the tallest structure in the world until the Chrysler Building in New York passed it in 1930. Aerials added since make it about 330 metres today.

Where

Barcelona, Spain

When

Begun 1882; still being finished (as of October 2026)

Who

Antoni Gaudí, from 1883 until his death in 1926

Style

Catalan Modernisme (the Catalan form of Art Nouveau)

Gaudí took over this church a year after it was begun and spent the rest of his life on it; he is buried in its crypt. When he died, less than a quarter of it was built. It has been built slowly ever since, paid for by donations and helped in recent years by computer design. In 2010 the Pope consecrated it as a basilica. On 30 October 2025 the first part of the cross went up on its central Tower of Jesus Christ, and the church passed Ulm Minster in Germany to become the tallest in the world. The cross was finished in February 2026, and the tower now stands 172.5 metres tall. Gaudí's Nativity façade and crypt are part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site (2005).

Where

Mill Run, Pennsylvania, United States

When

Designed 1935; built 1936 to 1939

Who

Frank Lloyd Wright, for the Kaufmann family

Style

Organic architecture

Made with

Local stone, reinforced concrete, steel and glass

The Kaufmann family hired Wright to design a weekend house on their land at Bear Run, a forest stream. He built it partly over a waterfall. Its concrete terraces are cantilevered: they stick out into the air, held only at one end, from a stone core. Wright called his approach organic architecture, meaning buildings that grow out of their site. In 2019 Fallingwater became part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site with seven other Wright buildings, including the spiral Guggenheim Museum in New York (1959). UCEED 2017 showed Fallingwater in a set of famous buildings and furniture.

Where

Poissy, near Paris, France

When

1928 to 1931

Who

Le Corbusier, with his cousin Pierre Jeanneret

Style

Modernism (International Style)

Made with

Reinforced concrete, painted white

A country house that shows all of Le Corbusier's five points of a new architecture: (1) pilotis, thin columns that lift the house off the ground; (2) a free plan, since the columns carry the weight and walls can go anywhere; (3) a free façade, for the same reason; (4) long horizontal ribbon windows; and (5) a roof garden. It is one of the 17 works in UNESCO's Le Corbusier World Heritage Site (2016), together with the Capitol Complex in Chandigarh.

Where

Bennelong Point, Sydney Harbour, Australia

When

Design chosen 1957; opened 1973

Who

Jørn Utzon, Denmark; finished by an Australian team led by Peter Hall

Style

Expressionism (modern)

Made with

Precast concrete shells covered in white and cream tiles

Utzon, then little known, won an international competition in 1957. Working out how to build his shells took years: in the end every shell was made from pieces of the same sphere, so the parts could be cast in a factory. After rows over cost he resigned in 1966 and never saw the finished building. Queen Elizabeth II opened it on 20 October 1973. It became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2007, while Utzon was still alive, and he won the Pritzker Prize in 2003.

Where

Bilbao, Spain, beside the river Nervión

When

Opened October 1997

Who

Frank Gehry (1929 to 2025), Canadian-American

Style

Deconstructivism

Made with

Titanium sheets, limestone and glass

A museum of modern art whose silvery titanium curves seem to twist and flow like a ship or a fish. Gehry won the Pritzker Prize in 1989. The museum brought so many visitors to a run-down industrial city that a landmark building that turns a city around is now said to have the "Bilbao effect".

Where

Courtyard of the Louvre Museum, Paris, France

When

Completed 1989

Who

I.M. Pei (1917 to 2019), Chinese-American

Style

Modernism

Made with

Glass panes on a metal frame

The Louvre needed a large new entrance hall, so Pei put it underground and lit it with a glass pyramid about 21.6 metres tall, with three smaller pyramids around it. Its sides slope at nearly the same angle as the pyramids of Egypt. Many Parisians hated a modern glass pyramid in front of an old royal palace, but it soon became one of the city's landmarks. Pei won the Pritzker Prize in 1983.

Where

Dubai, United Arab Emirates

When

Built 2004 to 2009; opened 2010

Who

Adrian Smith, chief architect at the firm Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM)

Made with

Reinforced concrete, with a steel spire and a glass and metal skin

At 828 metres, the Burj Khalifa has been the tallest building in the world since it opened, taking the title from Taipei 101. It is still the tallest as of October 2026; the Jeddah Tower in Saudi Arabia is being built to pass it, with completion planned for about 2028. Its floor plan is shaped like a Y with three wings, and the wings step back one by one in a spiral as the tower rises, so it gets slimmer towards the top.