Grand Egyptian Museum prepares for grand opening after three decades and more than $1 billion

Cairo – Egypt’s government will host dozens of foreign leaders and dignitaries on Saturday as it holds an official opening ceremony for the Grand Egyptian Museuma billion-dollar project decades in the making that was plagued by multiple delays and skyrocketing budgets.

The GEM is one of the largest museums in the world and the largest dedicated to a single civilization: ancient Egypt. Its subject spans some 7,000 years, from prehistory to the end of the Greek and Roman eras, around 400 AD.

The initial cost of the more than 5 million square foot triangular-themed structure, about a mile from the iconic pyramids of Giza, was estimated at $500 million, but the final price tag was more than double that. At a cost of more than a billion dollars, the the project was financed through Egyptian resources and international cooperation.

In front of the main entrance is the imposing 53-foot-tall Hanging Obelisk, the only structure of its kind in the world. The obelisk itself is about 3,500 years old, but it is suspended above a modern glass-floored structure, so visitors can look up and see its ancient inscriptions from an angle never before possible.

Beyond is the Grand Staircase, with 108 steps taking people up the equivalent of six floors to the main galleries, with colossal statues on view all the way.

The GEM has 12 main showrooms, covering approximately 194,000 square feet.

The number of artifacts on display has almost doubled initial expectations thanks to Egypt’s wealth of antiquities, and officials said around 100,000 items will be housed in the halls.

To put this in perspective, if a visitor spent one minute looking at each artifact on display in the museum, it would take them almost 70 sleepless days to see the entire collection.

The museum’s triangular architecture radiates from its entrance towards the three main pyramids of Giza, perfectly aligning with their positions. Its walls and sloping roofs follow the same line, rising towards the highest points of the pyramids, but without exceeding the height of the old structures, out of respect for their builders.

The interior of the museum offers stunning panoramic views of the pyramids. The concept may seem simple, but it required significant reshaping of the local topography, including excavating and removing some 79 million cubic feet of sand, which took workers seven months.

King Ramses II was there first.

In the GEM’s entrance courtyard is a huge 3,200-year-old statue of King Ramses II. The statue was moved in 2006 from a busy square in central Cairo to a site near the Great Pyramids, where it remained awaiting the construction of the new landmark museum.

The journey of the 83-tonne statue took 10 hours, slowly moving through the streets of Egypt under tight security while people watched on television.

Ramses was later moved to a new permanent home, about 400 meters away, and the museum was built around it.

King Tut Complete Collection

One could argue that the GEM’s main attraction is the complete collection of the famous Golden Boy King Tut.

The 5,398 objects from the tomb of the 13th pharaoh of the 18th Dynasty of ancient Egypt, who ruled from approximately 1333 to 1323 BC. C., will be displayed together in a single location for the first time since they were discovered by Howard Carter in 1922.

The new exhibition hall is six times larger than the one that previously housed much of Tut’s collection, in the former Egyptian Museum in central Cairo.

Ships of King Cheops

The GEM also has the Ships of King Cheops Museum, displaying 4,500-year-old ships that were designed to be used on the journey to the afterlife.

The two royal ships were discovered in 1954 near the Pyramid of Cheops. It took experts more than 10 years to reassemble the first boat. It is now completely rebuilt and moved to the museum in 2021. Museum visitors can also see the conservation work being carried out on the second.

Scholars believe they were used in Khufu’s funeral procession or were intended for his journey with the sun god Re in the afterlife.

The long road to the Grand Egyptian Museum

The idea of ​​a large museum at this site in Egypt dates back more than 32 years. The government first allocated 117 acres for the project at the site in 1992.

In early 2002, Egypt launched a huge international architectural competition to find a winning design for the museum. A total of 2,227 architects from 103 countries applied to submit designs, and by August of that year, 1,550 from 83 countries had submitted conceptual drawings.

A couple of months later, officials had narrowed the options to just 20 designs to present in a second stage. In July 2003, the prize and major contract were awarded to the Irish architecture firm Heneghan Peng.

The original plan was for the museum to open in 2010, but a series of events that included financial crisespolitical uprisingshe COVID-19 pandemic and regional wars delayed the raising of the curtain.

A government spokesman said the opening ceremony would attract a record number of world leaders, with up to 40 heads of state, including royalty, expected to attend along with a host of other senior officials from around the world, although no names have been confirmed.

Egyptian officials hope the new museum will boost the country’s tourism industry and, with it, the still-struggling economy. They have predicted that the GEM will attract about 5 million visitors a year.