Painstaking £745m restoration of the Notre-Dame sees sculptures, gargoyles and 315ft spire recreated

Nearly four years after a devastating fire, Notre Dame Cathedral finally rises from the ashes thanks to painstaking restoration work.

Sculptures have been recreated, gargoyles cleaned, and 2,000 oaks across France have been felled to recreate parts of the 13th-century building, including the iconic 95-meter spire.

Around 1,000 workers – including roofers, stonemasons and carpenters – are involved in the project, which is expected to cost more than the £745 million raised by donors.

The cathedral is not expected to reopen until December next year and final restorations are unlikely to be completed until 2025.

And throughout, one man has been charting the painstaking work on ‘Our Lady of Paris’ in these stunning photographs as it is reconstructed and restored little by little.

Photographer Patrick Zachmann, who is not a believer and had rarely set foot in the medieval cathedral, witnessed the fire on April 15, 2019 and was so moved by what he saw that he decided to document its rebirth.

Zachmann, 67, who works for the Magnum photography agency, told the Mail: “I was alerted by a friend who was working not far from Notre Dame and saw some smoke. At first it was not clear what exactly was going on, you wondered if it might be a terrorist attack.

“I was on my scooter, so I hurried over and watched for a few hours from a nearby bridge, the Pont de la Tournelle.

“The reaction of tourists and Parisians, they were really shocked and I felt the emotion – it was like a piece of our memory was disappearing.

“So that’s why I wanted to go in later and see for myself what had happened and the reality of the damage, and document the entire restoration process.

‘Usually I like to photograph people’s lives, not old stones and monuments, but I’ve come to see that the cathedral and its restoration is about human adventure and experience.

“It’s fascinating, and the restoration has brought together so many people from so many places, from the architects to the stonemasons.”

There is a workforce of approximately 1,000 ironworkers, glass masters, roofers, stonemasons, paint and sculpture restorers, carpenters and overseers; more than 3,000 tons of scaffolding has been installed; and France’s National Center for Scientific Research has provided high-tech assistance by creating a “digital double” of the cathedral that has provided information to help stabilize the building.

About 1,000 cubic meters of stone were excavated for the restoration. When the work is finally completed, another 41,000 square meters of stone surfaces, 2,000 square meters of stained glass and nearly 2,000 statues and sculptures will have been cleaned and restored.

The mammoth project is likely to cost more than the £745 million raised from donors around the world after the fire.

General Jean-Louis Georgelin, 74, France’s former chief of defense staff, who is in charge of the huge project, said: “The return of the spire to the sky of Paris, in my opinion, will be the symbol that we are fighting the battle. are winning. of Notre Dame.’

French officials have said there are no plans to reopen Notre Dame – which stands on a small island in the middle of the Seine and is possibly the most famous church in the world, a pilgrimage site for Roman Catholics from around the world and symbol of the French nation – for visitors and churchgoers until December 2024. Part of the last renovations are not expected to be completed until 2025.

The cause of the fire has not yet been determined, but investigators have ruled out arson.

Previously reported theories include a short in the electrical wiring or a cigarette thrown out by a workman.

Photographer Mr Zachmann said it was frightening when he first saw the blaze and the challenges firefighters faced in trying to control the blaze and secure the cathedral without damaging it or even causing it to collapse further.

“It was hard to know if they would succeed, especially when the spire collapsed,” he said. ‘At the same time I heard people screaming in shock.’

He entered the cathedral just over two months after the fire and has since returned more than 100 times.

“It’s a fantastic feeling to see it being restored. It is a piece of history, a symbol of Paris and France, which was disappearing.

“Sometimes I go ten days in a row and I can’t believe what they’ve done so quickly and how it’s changed in that time,” said Mr. Zachmann.

‘Now the cathedral is being restored little by little – it’s really emotional to see. And they go further than repairing the fire damage, they also clean things that have not been damaged by the fire, but rather by time.’

So for him, he says, the fire might somehow be seen as ‘un mal pour un bien’ – or a blessing in disguise.