To tourists and Frenchmen alike, ascending the steps of Paris’ iconic Eiffel Tower is like climbing a stairway to heaven.

On Thursday, a spiral segment of the tower’s original staircase sold for more than $521,000 (€450,000) in an auction held in Paris, Reuters reported.

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The buyer, who was in the auction room when it sold, now owns a 14-step section of the staircase that was part of the structure when the tower opened in central Paris on March 31, 1889, to commemorate the World’s Fair that year.

The final price of $521,825.47 was the exchange rate when the auction ended.

It stands 9 feet tall and weighs 1.4 tons and connected the second and third floors, according to the auction listing.

“When you buy a ​piece of the Eiffel Tower, you’re buying a piece ⁠of Paris, along with all the imagination and symbolism it represents,” ​Sabrina Dolla, Art Deco design director at Artcurial Paris auction ​house where the sale took place, told Reuters.

The tower was designed by French engineer Gustave Eiffel, the structure once featured the spiral staircase, The New York Times reported. It gave access from the second level to the top of the Eiffel Tower.

In 1983, as part of a modernization project, workers dismantled the stairs to install elevators, according to the newspaper.

The staircase was then partitioned into 24 sections. Four were donated to museums and the rest were sold at auctions, the Times reported.

The one that sold this week had been owned by an unidentified French businessman, according to the newspaper.

According to Reuters, portions ⁠of the tower staircase are preserved near the Statue of Liberty in New York, in the gardens of the Yoshi Foundation ​in Yamanashi, Japan, as well as in private foreign ​collections.

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