Pierre Cardin offering glass skyscraper to Venice

French fashion designer Pierre Cardin has designed a gift meant as an economic catalyst to Venice and the region: an 800-foot-tall modernist glass skyscraper housing a fashion university, luxury hotel suites and shops, according to an August 25 Associated Press report.

The proposed $3 billion project has been described alternatively as a spaceship that crashed into the lagoon, a shiny fishing lure or an illuminated mushroom, according to AP. "It is seen with interest, but at the same time with open perplexity," Claudio Borghello, a Venice city councilman, told AP.

Under the proposal, Cardin would clean up pollutants from the land, invest $1.75 billion himself and endow the fashion university, according to the article.

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