The Ryugyong Hotel (Korean: 류경호텔; sometimes spelled as Ryu-Gyong Hotel), or Yu-Kyung Hotel, is an unfinished 105-story, 330-metre-tall (1,080 ft) pyramid-shaped skyscraper in Pyongyang, North Korea. Its name (“capital of willows”) is also one of the historical names for Pyongyang. The building is also known as the 105 Building, a reference to its number of floors. The building has been planned as a mixed-use development, which would include a hotel.
Construction began in 1987 but was halted in 1992 as North Korea entered a period of economic crisis after the dissolution of the Soviet Union. After 1992, the building stood topped out, but without any windows or interior fittings. In 2008, construction resumed, and the exterior was completed in 2011. The hotel was planned to open in 2012, the centenary of Kim Il-sung’s birth. A partial opening was announced for 2013, but this was cancelled. In 2018, an LED display was fitted to one side, which is used to show propaganda animations and film scenes.
Pictures have emerged showing the inside of a 105-storey pyramid-shaped hotel that has been under construction in Pyongyang for 25 years.
North Korea began building the Ryugyong hotel in 1987, but construction was halted for 16 years when funds ran out.
Although work restarted in 2008, the hotel has become, for many, a symbol of North Korea’s thwarted ambitions.
The tour company that took the pictures say the hotel is now due to open in two or three years time.
Few people have been allowed inside the notorious hotel, which has been variously dubbed the “The Hotel of Doom” or “The Phantom Hotel”.
When conceived, the Ryugyong was intended to communicate to the world an impression of North Korea’s burgeoning wealth.
But other economic priorities meant that the hotel had to be put to one side, and it remained untouched until a city-wide “beautification scheme” was introduced five years ago.
At that time, external construction was forecast to take until the end of 2010, with work on the inside being completed in 2012 at the earliest.
But the photo of the interior taken by Koryo Tours, a Beijing-based company that specialises in travel to North Korea, shows a vast concrete lobby with barriers around the edge of each floor.
The bare interior has no sign of cabling, wiring or pipes, let alone furnishings
| General information | |
|---|---|
| Status | On hold |
| Architectural style | Neo-futurism |
| Location | Ryugyong-dong, Potonggang-guyok, Pyongyang, North Korea |
| Coordinates |  39°02′12″N 125°43′51″ECoordinates: 39°02′12″N 125°43′51″E |
| Construction started | 28 August 1987[ |
| Topped-out | 1992 |
| Estimated completion | Unknown (Exterior construction completed: 14 July 2011[2]) |
| Height | |
| Roof | 330.02 metres (1,082.7 ft) |
| Technical details | |
| Floor count | Above ground 105, Underground 3 |
| Floor area | 360,000 m2 (3,900,000 sq ft) |