Trekkies bored of their annual conventions now have a new place of pilgrimage - the offices of a gaming firm in the obscure Chinese city of Fuzhou.

As these aerial shots show, the exterior of the NetDragon Websoft HQ in the south-eastern province of Fujian bears a striking resemblance to the shape of Star Trek’s USS Enterprise spaceship.

It's no accident. Mashable reports that Liu DeJian, the chairman of the tech firm, is an "uber Trekkie". He sought permission from the CBS broadcasting network in the US to create the $160m homage, which was built between 2008 and 2014 and is the only officially-licensed Star Trek replica building in the world.

The interior features other Star Trek-inspired elements, including automatic sliding gates between the different working areas. There are also 30-foot metal slides on the third floor that allow quick access to the ground level, and a replica of a Tyrannosaurus rex dinosaur nicknamed Stan (after the palaeontologist who discovered parts of its skeleton in South Dakota in 1987).

There have been previous attempts to build a USS Enterprise replica. In 1992, the Los Angeles-based entertainment venue design firm Goddard Group announced plans to launch a giant model of the Star Trek spaceship, but the project fell through.



The Starship Enterprise in the Star Trek film in 1979 (Alamy)

The $150 million replica would have loomed over downtown Las Vegas and become the “world’s largest attraction” and the “Eighth Wonder of the World”, Gary Goddard, the chairman and CEO of the group, claimed on the company’s website.



A rendering of the proposed Starship Enterprise replica in Las Vegas (Goddard Group)

The ship was to feature “all of the key rooms, chambers, decks and corridors that we knew from the movie” as well as a “a high-speed travelator that would whisk you from deck to deck”, he added.

Last year, it was reported that one Star Trek-obsessed fan built a replica ship worth £300,000 in his basement. Anthony Sforza, 48, has loved the show for as long as he can remember and started collecting action figures in the Eighties. He spent three years and more than 1,500 working hours recreating the interior of the iconic Enterprise ship in his Long Island home.

Ten unusually-shaped buildings

L'Hemisferic

This eye-shaped planetarium is the central structure of Valencia’s City of Arts and Science complex, and features a domed iMax cinema. It is built over a pool, creating a reflection of itself to complete the shape of the eye.



Photo: Alamy

Lucy the Elephant

This elephant-shaped attraction sits in New Jersey’s Josephine Harron Park. It is six storeys high and listed among the National Park Registry of Historical Landmarks in the US. Visitors can climb a spiral staircase all the way up to its back for panoramic views.



Photo: Alamy

The AT&T building

The façade of the US telecommunications company building in Nashville, Tennessee, is said to resembles the head of Batman.



Photo: Alamy

The Hitler House

A photo of this house in Swansea was shared on Twitter by thousands of people thanks to its (ever so slight) resemblance to Hitler.



Photo: Athena

Dog Bark Park Inn

The Dog Bark Park Inn, a US B&B, is located inside a 12-foot beagle. Guests (it sleeps four) enter the beagle’s body through the second-storey deck. It is, of course, pet-friendly.



Photo: Alamy

Sheraton Huzhou Hot Spring Resort

Nicknamed the ‘doughnut hotel’, this luxury resort sits on Taihu Lake, between Nanjing and Shanghai. The magnet-shaped hotel was conceived by architect Ma Tansong, who has worked with Zaha Hadid in London and is responsible for the rippling Absolute Towers in Mississauga, Canada. The 27 floors above water, and two below (to create a complete oval) feature luxury trimmings, including a lobby paved with White Jade from Afghanistan and Tiger’s Eye Stone from Brazil.



Photo: Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, Inc.

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Warped tower

This solar furnace at Font-Romeu-Odeillo-Via in the Pyrenees has a curved wall of mirrors that sucks in light to generate heat. The tower's warped reflection of the surrounding French countryside creates a striking image. It is the largest solar furnace in the world and opened in 1970. Visitors are welcome.

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Photo: Alamy

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The Haines Shoe House

Built by shoe salesman Mahlon Haines in 1948 to advertise his wares, this five-storey curiosity has a living room in the toes, a kitchen in the heel, two bedrooms in the ankle and an ice cream shop in the instep.



Photo: Alamy

The Pineapple at Dunmore Park

Built by the 4th Earl of Dunmore in the 1760s as a present for his wife, the fruity pavillion in Scotland was intended as a place for her to view the walled gardens of the family estate. Now visitors can follow it her footsteps - it can be rented as holiday accommodation through the Landmark Trust.



Photo: Alamy

Crooked House

The three-storey Crooked House in Sopot, Poland was designed by Polish architect Szotynscy Zaleski and inspired by Jan Marcin Szancer‘s fairytale illustrations and the art of Per Dahlberg. It's become the country's most photographed building.



Photo: Alamy

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