A STRANGE replica of Paris with a fake Eiffel Tower lies almost abandoned in China.
Tianducheng in Hangzhou could easily be mistaken for the French capital at first glance due to its architecture that exudes Parisian elegance.
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But lacking a bustling, touristy atmosphere, it quickly becomes exposed as a copycat city.
Rusty statues, weeds growing on the slopes of the Eiffel Tower and industrial buildings with plumes of smoke in the background ruin the romantic illusion of Paris.
For years, Gaudy Mime was practically a ghost town, with only 2,000 residents calling it home.
The huge £1bn development opened in 2007 but failed to attract enough people to fill its 10,000 capacity.
His imitation Eiffel Tower is only one-third the height of the French original and measures just 300 feet tall.
The imitation Champs-Elysées avenue is extremely quiet compared to the real thing.
Although Haussmann-style houses line the streets of the faux “Paris of the East,” inside they remain empty.
Tianducheng was even given its own Versailles Palace gardens with geometric landscapes and fountains that are now completely dry.
But the reason no one fell head over heels in love with the fake City of Light was partly due to its remote location.
Tianducheng is surrounded by hectares of farmland and is shrouded in thick smog from nearby industrial cities.
Only tourists and newlywed couples, in search of a perfect setting, embarked on an hour-long trip from the provincial capital.
But in 2017 the situation improved slightly and the Paris clone would house 30,000 residents.
As more people moved in, Beijing pumped more money into the city, opening a subway station to connect it to Hangzhou.
But despite efforts to increase the population, the city still gives off an eerie feeling.
Jarryd Salem, who previously visited the town, told News.com.au: “The atmosphere has become stranger and more complex.
“Tianducheng is an urban development that has failed spectacularly.”
China has built several “duplicate” cities in a bid to combat the projected demographic crisis in the country of 1.5 billion people.
However, the government’s policy of building housing without guaranteed occupants failed as more cities became ghost towns.
Rachel Ni, who moved to Tianducheng six years ago, told ABC News: “I think it’s a bit strange.
“I live here because it’s cheap. In Hangzhou, this is very, very cheap.”
It is just one of the many strange “fake” monuments built by China during its infatuation with “duplitectura.”
Sprawling across 3,700 acres on the foothills of the Cangshan mountain range, the popular resort, nicknamed “fake Santorini”, has copied the island’s iconic whitewashed cobblestone lanes and blue windows.
Another luxury hotel in China, aptly named The Londoner, pays homage to the best of British culture, even imitating the Changing of the Guard.
Other hoaxes include a replica of a quaint English town that has everything from a church, a pub and even ivy growing on faux Tudor buildings.
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