The title compound tetraoxa [3.5] paracyclophane (6) has been prepared and studied in order to investigate the evolution of spectroecopic properties in going from the monomer unit p-dimethoxybenzene (9) via the noncyclic bichromophoric reference compound 3b to 6. The X-ray structural analysis of 6 shows that the distance between the two aromatic carbon atoms linked to the smaller bridge is shorter than the van der Waals distance. The ...