Guinness Admits It Was Too 'Heavy-Handed'

UPDATE Feb 9, 2024 8:42 AM CST

Richard Plaud will have his name in the record books after all. Guinness World Records initially ruled the Frenchman had used the wrong type of matchsticks in building his 23.6-foot-tall replica of the Eiffel Tower. However, it later said it was reviewing the decision and on Friday announced it had awarded Plaud the record for "tallest matchstick sculpture," per NBC News. After reviewing Plaud's techniques and similar record attempts, Guinness decided it had been "heavy-handed in the application of our rules." A rep added, "We have corrected some inconsistencies within our rules which now allow the matchsticks to be snipped and shaped as the modeller sees fit."

Feb 7, 2024 8:40 AM CST

For 4,200 hours over the past eight years, Richard Plaud has used more than 700,000 matchsticks to assemble the masterpiece of his life: a nearly 24-foot-tall replica of the Eiffel Tower, which he hoped would gain him admittance into Guinness World Records after he completed it in late December. Now, however, the 47-year-old Frenchman says he's been rebuffed, claiming that the "global authority on all things record-breaking" didn't even look at his application before rejecting him, reports Sky News. Plaud, who started building his tower in 2015, finished it up on Dec. 27—the 100th anniversary of the death of Eiffel Tower designer Gustave Eiffel, reports the Telegraph.

And at first glance, his replica does indeed beat the previous record held by Lebanese model-builder Toufic Daher, who crafted a 21.4-foot Eiffel Tower replica in 2009 (Plaud's came in at 23.6 feet). But Plaud says that Guinness isn't accepting his efforts because of two rules they say he flouted: one, that the matches used be commercially purchased and not have flammable red tips, and two, that the matches not be cut or otherwise altered "to the point where they are no longer recognized" as matches, per Sky. Plaud had started off buying the matches himself, as per the rules, and then cutting the red tips off, but he decided that was too time-consuming and so arranged to have the matchstick manufacturer send him boxes of matches directly.

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He doesn't think the matches are unrecognizable as matches, but Guinness apparently disagrees. "It's disappointing, frustrating, incomprehensible, and not very fair play," Plaud tells the London Times, via the Telegraph. He isn't sure what he's going to do with the tower next. Plaud's wife, meanwhile, may share in his disappointment, but may be glad on one front now that her husband's project is complete: Late last year, as he was finishing up the tower, she told French media she was looking forward to finally getting her living room back. Check out Plaud's creation here. (More Guinness World Records stories.)