La Pyramide: The Futuristic soul of Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire.
In the heart of Abidjan’s administrative district, La Pyramide rises as a 62-meter monument to the era of the “Ivorian Miracle.” Designed by architect Rinaldo Olivieri and engineer Riccardo Morandi between 1968 and 1973, a 15-story brutalist landmark meant to announce Côte d’Ivoire onto the global stage.
Over time, however, humidity, aging infrastructure, and rising maintenance costs led to the building’s gradual decline. Today, La Pyramide is no longer viewed as a failed project, but as one of the most powerful symbols of African Modernism, a memory of extraordinary optimism and a challenge to a new generation of architects to rethink the future of the African city.