When soot and dust give way: When walking around this special construction site of the Notre-Dame, the radiantly restored murals cannot be overlooked.
Image: Patrick Zachmann/Magnum Photos/Agency Focus
It burst into flames, and all of France cried. Now hundreds of workers are rebuilding them with loving attention to detail. Notre-Dame is said to be more beautiful than ever.
Ahen Philippe Villeneuve placed the final stone in the new vault in the north transept of Notre-Dame, he could not hold back a tear. “It’s a pretty exciting time for us because we’re finally seeing the result of our efforts,” says the 59-year-old chief architect for France’s heritage agency, who has been in charge of the cathedral since 2013. The way to the vault leads via a modern freight elevator of German design, which transports bricklayers and visitors to the top floor of the scaffolding in no time at all. The freshly applied screed made of lime and fibers over the stone vault still shimmers wet, it now has to dry out. 14 cubic meters of stones were used for the reconstruction.
When on the evening of April 15, 2019 the flames blazed out of the roof structure and the spire collapsed under the conflagration before the eyes of the world public, Villeneuve was devastated. “He’s carried the cathedral with him since he was little,” says General Jean-Louis Georgelin of his comrade-in-arms. The Five Star General a. D. heads the public institution that was established three years ago specifically to rebuild Notre-Dame. When Georgelin talks about the next stages, it sounds as if he is formulating a military battle plan.