Notre-Dame de Paris

J. Jericho

As a visitor, I found Notre-Dame de Paris one of the most peaceful places I have ever been. I'm glad restoration is planned. I have no doubt that it will be done magnificently.

A Former User

@J-Jericho

You are right. When I was a student (ND is close to the "Quartier Latin" and the Sorbonne) I spent a lot of time in the cathedral to rest or to concentrate before the exams...Sometime, the organist was practicing!
Later I attended to a lot of organ concerts.
Regarding the restoration, it has already been done in the middle of the 19 th century by Violet-Leduc partly thanks to Victor Hugo and his book. At the beginning of the 19th century ND was in bad shape.
Violet-Leduc was a specialist of the middle age architecture and he restored, for instance the city of Carcassonne:
https://photo.femmeactuelle.fr/carcassonne-la-cite-medievale-27731#porte-narbonnaise-477351
and the Pierrefond castle:
https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Château_de_Pierrefonds#/media/File:Château_de_Pierrefonds_vu_depuis_le_Parc.jpg
Not that bad!
We have a lot of cathedral in France (I was told something like 90) so we can expect to have somme specialists to make the restoration.
If you are interested (and have some time), here is a link to an interesting visit of Notre Dame before the fire.

Unfortunately only in French but when you see the pictures you can imagine the damages...
It is quite long (51mn) but starting at 8'40 you can see what was called "the forest", ie 800 years old woods that sustained the roof and burned.
Regards

A Former User

Hello,

As far as we know, the organ is not distroyed but has to be completely disassembled and reassembled...A lot of work.
Here is a link to a documentary about the organ.
https://www.arte.tv/fr/videos/057383-000-A/dans-le-ventre-de-l-orgue-de-notre-dame/
A concert « live » was not only a musical shock but a physical shock. You could feel the low register waves hitting your body.
Regards.

Newell Post

@Voltrane With the money they now have to spend, I'll bet the organ comes out of a re-build much better than it was....

Newell Post

As an aside, I once worked next door to a pipe organ factory that went back to the 19th century. They had the most amazing woodworking shop I have ever seen anywhere. (And I have worked in the building design and construction industry my whole life.) Many of their machine tools went back to 1880, but were immense and incredibly powerful and accurate. When they got a new commission, trucks would show up piled high with rough-sawn lumber. They surfaced it and cut it into anything they needed. The only thing they didn't make from scratch was the brass tubing for the little bitty pipes. Unfortunately, they didn't build many new organs. Most of their business was repairing and restoring old ones. But they had a large room where they assembled new organs for testing and final voicing. They sometimes had open houses when one was ready to ship with performers playing them for demonstration purposes. It was quite an experience to take the shop tour and hear the demo. It even got used in a cult horror movie once. (Start at around 6:52)

Rapier232

York Minster, in the UK was gutted by fire, as was Windsor Castle. We rebuilt both. The craftsman are still in existence to effect such skilled work.

mafields627

One comment that I read was that a huge difficulty will be that trees are no longer available in that region that are as large as the ones originally used. Perhaps this will be a global restoration or alternative materials will be used.

trickg

@mafields627 said in Notre-Dame de Paris:

One comment that I read was that a huge difficulty will be that trees are no longer available in that region that are as large as the ones originally used. Perhaps this will be a global restoration or alternative materials will be used.

I thought I saw something the other day about how they already had replacement timbers cut and stored for an event such as this, or for if/when those timbers eventually needed replacing, although my Google-fu can't seem to find anything about that at the moment.

I just read about Reims Cathedral and the restoration that went on when it got damaged so badly during WWI. The entire roof burned, and it was replaced with steel - maybe "restoring" Notre Dame de Paris to original spec isn't the best idea, but rather updating certain things with modern materials would be better.

Newell Post

@trickg There is an active debate about that right now among the architectural and historic communities. There are three possible strategies:

Replace everything with historically accurate things, right down to the wood pegs holding the rafters together. This maintains the original configuration, but those wouldn't really be 12th century pegs now, would they?
Restore the exterior as it was, but use modern structural materials in the "attic" and places where they are not visible. This maintains the original appearance, but clearly says to anyone interested that the structural work is 21st century.
Fix the stone vaults, but do something completely new with the roof that clearly expresses our own age. That may seem heretical to some, but there are cathedrals that were built over many hundreds of years that changed drastically in style as they expanded. Witnesseth St. Albans, north of London. Salisbury might seem "prettier" to some since it was built in a very short period of time and is therefore very consistent in style throughout. But St. Albans is a great expression of the times in which is was built.

A Former User

The debates remind me another big and hot debate regarding Le Louvre, when it was necessary, not to restore but to adapt the museum. Many Parisians, me included were opposed to this:
https://www.google.fr/search?q=pyramide+du+louvre&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&hl=fr-fr&client=safari#imgdii=nDwaSTF8TIX6jM:&imgrc=xRY4MlRryNxgkM:
But after a visit when it was completed, I understood I was wrong.
And after all, in 1380, the Louvre was like that:
https://fr.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fichier:Le_Louvre_sous_Charles_V,_1380.jpg
So...
By the way, we are lucky : since the fire the weather is nice in Paris. Nice « April in Paris ».Quite no wind, no rain that could have finished the work...

A Former User

Well, since a few days the weather is not longer fine. Some rain and some wind but the cathedral is now protected as you can see in the video.
http://www.lefigaro.fr/flash-actu/video-notre-dame-desormais-entierement-protegee-par-une-bache-20190429

Regards

Pinstriper

@Newell-Post said in Notre-Dame de Paris:

@trickg There is an active debate about that right now among the architectural and historic communities. There are three possible strategies:
[snip]

Fix the stone vaults, but do something completely new with the roof that clearly expresses our own age.

So, SuperMegaJumbotron streaming Netflix originals 24x7 ?

I wonder if they will sell the naming rights.

administrator

Notre-Dame de Paris...brought to you by Microsoft.

Pinstriper

@administrator said in Notre-Dame de Paris:

Notre-Dame de Paris...brought to you by Microsoft.

I was thinking Uber, or maybe something more temporal.

Uber welcomes you to Amazon Prime Notre Dame Cathedral presented by Guardians Of The Galaxy III. You're in good hands.

administrator

@Pinstriper said in Notre-Dame de Paris:

@administrator said in Notre-Dame de Paris:

Notre-Dame de Paris...brought to you by Microsoft.

I was thinking Uber, or maybe something more temporal.

Uber welcomes you to Amazon Prime Notre Dame Cathedral presented by Guardians Of The Galaxy III. You're in good hands.

Ugh...goodness gracious. There is a NBA arena in a city near where I live, and its name has changed 3 or 4 times in recent history. It loses sponsors, they change their names, etc. I'm really not sure if our founding fathers intended capitalism to become the hyper-corporatism is has turned into.

Tobylou8

@administrator said in Notre-Dame de Paris:

@Pinstriper said in Notre-Dame de Paris:

@administrator said in Notre-Dame de Paris:

Notre-Dame de Paris...brought to you by Microsoft.

I was thinking Uber, or maybe something more temporal.

Uber welcomes you to Amazon Prime Notre Dame Cathedral presented by Guardians Of The Galaxy III. You're in good hands.

Ugh...goodness gracious. There is a NBA arena in a city near where I live, and its name has changed 3 or 4 times in recent history. It loses sponsors, they change their names, etc. I'm really not sure if our founding fathers intended capitalism to become the hyper-corporatism is has turned into.

It's just advertising. I like NASCAR. Sometimes it's a great way to cure insomnia!! Winners used to just say, "The car ran really good today and the crew did a great job". NOW, "The Lowes Dupont Bass Tracker Home Depot Minute Made Skoal Bandit Chevrolet running on Goodyear Eagle racing GT's with rubber supplied by Office Max rubber bands and changed by the Google Microsoft Apple pit crew wearing shoes from Nike ran well today"! My wife and I just laugh!

Newell Post

Ha! Try living in San Francisco.

2000: Pacific Bell Park
2003: SBC Park
2006: AT&T Park
2019: Oracle Park

But Candlestick Park was always Candlestick Park, the way God intended.

mafields627

My favorite is the University of Phoenix Stadium, which 1) is named for a for-profit college that doesn't have a football team and 2) is actually an NFL stadium.

Vulgano Brother

How about Mercedes in the window.