In 1861, the lighthouse at the end of the world was indeed a prototype and was to serve as a model for a long series of identically reproduced metal towers.
Designed with the particularity of being completely removable, the new architectural technology of the time, metal construction, was to allow the prefabrication and standardization of objects. In addition, the size of the parts had to be adjusted so that they could be loaded, unloaded and erected without sophisticated lifting gear, in places where local construction was a problem.
But, only a second copy came out of the Rigolet workshops located at the Buttes-Chaumont in Paris (and not from the Eiffel workshops as a certain legend had suggested…).
Erected 20,000 km away from its exotic model, in a completely different environment, the Roches-Douvres lighthouse illuminated the coasts of Northern Brittany off the island of Bréhat until 1944 when the German army completely destroyed it.
Long before that, this copy had been on display for several months of the 1867 World Exhibition in Paris as one of the “key” attraction, two decades before the Eiffel Tower.