The history of the Tour Sans Fins is linked to the early projects for La Défense.

As a testimony to the lack of completed construction in La Défense, the winning design was selected next to an outdoor parking lot of the RER The winner of this contest was Jean Nouvel, and his Tour Sans Fins was meant to be 425m tall and would have been the tallest skyscraper in Europe.

Technical reasons in addition to the early 1990s recession resulted in the project being cancelled despite 20 million French francs being already spent.

At its base the tower would have gone several levels down below the earth, like a crater, and would have ended with a tuned mass damper absorbing vibrations on its top.

As Jean Nouvel said: You don't quite know where the cylinder begins and ends because it rises from an excavation and dissipates into the sky.48°53′40″N 2°14′11″E / 48.8944°N 2.2364°E / 48.8944; 2.2364