Notre-Dame Rises From the Ashes

[Music]. from The New York Times I'm Michael. Babar this is the. daily on Sunday after a fire that many.

feared would destroy it and a swift. renovation that defied all predictions. the Cathedral of notredam reopened to. the. [Music]. public today Chief architecture critic. Michael kimmelman with the story of the. mircle on the. S it's Wednesday de member.

[Music]. 11th Michael welcome to the daily thank. you Michael pleasure to be here I'm just. going to acknowledge that we have been. trying to get you on the show for seven. years and then two days more because. over the past couple of days there's.

been a tremendous amount of very serious. news the government in Syria fell a. closely watched Manhunt for the. suspected murderer of the CEO of a major. Healthcare company that case got cracked. wide open all of which delayed this much. awaited debut of yours on the show and. today is the day you our chief. architecture critic finally here talking. about something worthy of your. biography notredam so welcome well.

better late than never I hope yes well. just to begin do you remember the first. time you stepped inside that Cathedral I. mean I remember as a boy going with my. family and we had come from the Soviet. Union. where I was unable to find milk I was. probably eight parison turns out has. milk.

it was cold but I do remember going into. the cathedral and feeling somehow warmed. when I went in there so that was my. first impression I guess it stuck with. me in some way so your memory of it is. vague but the impression I'm getting is. that whatever it did to you it did. something yeah I think it does to. millions and millions of people who have. no religious connection to it it was a. place that people imagined they had to.

go to if they went to Paris you didn't. see Paris unless you went to notredam so. let's fast forward a good deal to. several years. ago where were you when you first heard. that notredam was. burning I remember very vividly where I. was I was on my bike uh rushing to an. appointment on the west side of. Manhattan my phone. rang and it was an editor here at the. times who uh sounded a little frantic.

and told me I uh had to rush back and. write something because notron was. burning and I thought he was crazy well. crazy why because notam has a giant. Stone building I didn't think it could. burn down and it sounded sort of. inconceivable it's like Everest it. doesn't burn down so I the pyramids do. not burn down there you go and I said.

I'm sorry to tell you this but his name. is also Michael. so um I said Michael that that doesn't. make sense he said I think you just. better look on your phone right and I. went to find a live. feed and there it. [Music]. was I'm now turning to the back of the. cathedral it is a terrible scene here. the roof has entirely collapsed there. are Flames coming out of the back of the. cathedral as if it was a torch it looks.

like the Olympic torch from the back I. remember standing there on the corner. just Frozen staring at. this sight which seemed. inconceivable and then Twitter was just. full of pray for Paris hashtag and. everybody was suddenly fixated maybe. it's the sign from God I don't know it's. not normal it really was as if the world.

had stopped I see people crying I see um. a lot of emotions and I'm shocked myself. it's like a your family loses somebody. both my sister and I said you know we we. are actually. feeling physical pain watching notam you. feel like it's part of you then when you. look at this 12th. century medieval Cathedral Up in Flames. uh it's like a knife it's very hard for.

me not to cry right now so and I've been. crying on and off the whole day um it. just has touched touched me and touched. everyone in France I think very very. deeply it occurred to me at that moment. too that's interesting I mean why had. the world stopped why did this building. mean so much to so many different people. not just people in France but obviously. all around the world.

so I rushed back to my computer I. started making a few phone calls and. trying to figure that out trying to. understand what the building had meant. over time and to see really what the. building now represented to people what. this potential disaster I mean it was. certainly a disaster but there was the. fear of course that the building would. disappear that this would be the moment. after almost 900 years that we were. living at that moment when this building.

would go away well I'm I'm curious when. this. inquiry is moving along and you're. making phone calls and you're. researching the history of notredam and. trying to understand why the feelings. about its burning are so widespread and. so deep what do you find well I think. Michael you have to step back and say. what is the meaning of a building I mean. for me architecture is really the world. we built at are building I think a lot.

of people have talked about it as a kind. of aesthetic thing and that is one. aspect of it for sure and I think the. conversation around architecture for a. while sort of saw it as a branch of. sculpture you know whether buildings. were cool looking they were fetishized. aestheticized and there's definitely an. aspect of that that's important in. architecture but I've always felt that. really architecture is much larger than. that buildings are living things that.

exist in our lives in our neighborhoods. communities cities and they're there. whether we choose to look at them or not. they have to be used and so really they. rais these questions of what do they say. about us as a society and in the case of. notam it's been speaking it's meant. things to people over Generations over. centuries for almost a thousand years. well tell us a little bit about that. history and I suspect through that we. will understand what it has meant to US.

during that entire. period Well I think you know the. building has had a lot of meanings over. time you first of all have to see where. it sits geographically it sits at the. center of Paris on an island in the. middle of the sen River and that island. is where what came to be called Paris. started literally literally it had been. a prehistoric settlement and then was an. ancient settlement the Romans settled. there it was a Gallow Roman. town called ltia occupied by the.

Pary I I didn't know any of this there. you go I'm you're. welcome I hope it's. [Laughter]. true and then when the church was there. there was original religious buildings. and sanctuaries built on the island over. centuries it was invaded by Vikings and. then eventually in the 12th century a. bishop of Paris decided that they should.

build a Gothic Cathedral there and this. was the new style it was a little like. the pyramids in the sense that these. were buildings of an incredible scale. and ambition and weirdness and Majesty. um complexity so they tore down some of. the old church buildings which were on. the East End of the island and started. erecting this building and since then. that was in the. 1160s the building has remained the. center of the city it's essentially.

witnessed the growth of the city it's. been the sun around which the city has. revolved mhm it's the place from which. all distances in France are measured. literally there's a plaque on the plaza. in front of it in other words all French. roads quite literally lead to this. Cathedral that's right in a sense. everything is circulates around it but I. think also it has witnessed a lot of. important events in French history.

Mary Queen of Scots was married there. Napoleon was coronated there and when. the revolution happened you had you know. the insurgence of Revolution they. ransacked notredam H it was a symbol. they hated the church they knocked off. the heads of the Old Testament figures. on the front who they thought were Kings. and they melted down the bells and. turned them into cannonballs and coins. it's fascinating cuz what could better.

embody the idea of a single building's. importance to a place than it becomes a. central Target of an effort to overturn. the entire system yeah by the time of. Napoleon right after the. revolution the place was a wreck it was. a dump it had been ruined During the. Revolution but it was also falling apart. when Napoleon decided to have his. coronation there it was so bad that he. had to get a couple of Architects like. very high level interior decorators to. basically. hang a lot of tapestries to cover up all.

the mess behind it like a stage set and. then that also caused Victor Hugo the. writer to write a book about a hunchback. bell ringer MH in which he heard of it. he spends a chapter of lamenting what. had happened to notredam that this was. said what it said about France and what. notredam meant to the country I don't. think we can miss an opportunity since.

you brought it with you to read from the. Hunchback of notredam and understand. what it was about the way Hugo wrote. about it that inspired people to want to. make. it better and restore it yeah he wrote. in uh shall we say ripe. pros and in Long voluptuous sentences. but I'll read you a couple. mhm um so first of all he begins this.

chapter about notredam he says the. Church of notredam De Peri is without. doubt even today a Sublime and Majestic. building but however much it may have. conserved its beauty as it has grown. older it is hard not to regret not to. feel indignation at the numberless. degradations and mutilations which time. and men have brought simultaneously on. this venerable Monument H it's a call to. Arms it's a call to Arms exactly.

great buildings he says like great. mountains are the works of. centuries the man the individual and the. artist are erased from these great piles. which bear no author's name they are the. summary and summation of human. intelligence time is the architect the. nation the Builder which I think is. interesting Michael because that's the. point notredam for him represented. France and so its recovery its. preservation was about France's.

preservation its Heritage its. strength Hugo had no particular patience. with the church but he believed that the. building itself meant a lot to the. nation and that book came at the same. time as a movement was rising in France. to preserve its. Heritage and those two things LED to the. restoration of notredam in the 19th.

century to prevent its collapse. basically and to restore. it and that was a key moment in the. history of not just notredam and Paris. but the whole idea of historic. preservation. globally it reminds me of what you said. at the beginning this conversation by. architecture is that this is not some.

abstract piece of architecture it's. living it's breathing it tells us. something essential about who we are at. any given moment and Hugo as you said. he's not saying that through an. especially religious lens he's seeing. this more as a secular Temple a palace. of the people that's right he saw it as. representing all sorts of romantic. ideals about the people about Community. about glory and that book helped Inspire.

the renovation of the cathedral in the. 19th century it was brought back we got. the Spire that then became famous on the. Paris Skyline Hugo's book also made it. more of a attraction people wanted to. come to Paris to see the building. eventually Disney wanted to make movies. about it people from all over the world. came more of them then went to see the. Eiffel Tower in Paris more of them then. went to visit the St Peter's Basilica in.

Rome and in that sense it really did. become truly a palace of the people and. so what did this fire say about us about. this moment that the horror of it was. that our moment would be the moment when. this building across this great Ark of. History would disappear what did that. say about how we had cared for it and. even the fact that it was on fire was. clearly an indication that we' been.

derelict it was a fire that never needed. to happen and it wasn't a great world. war that had destroyed other Cathedrals. it was a guy who probably left a. cigarette butt lighted in the rafters. and then somebody else who went to the. wrong place to check out why there was. an alarm it seemed so banale and it. seemed like it said something about us. in this moment well since you just. brought it up remind us how severe this. fire ends up being it was really severe.

it started in the rafters and the. rafters are made out of oak wood and. spread to the Spire which is made out of. wood too and Lead right you were wrong. when you were on the bike telling your. editor it couldn't burn there's a lot of. wood in that Cathedral I was extremely. wrong and it wasn't just the roof was on. fire and the Spire was collapsing it was. a very dangerous and complex thing for. the firemen to try to put this fire out.

they couldn't dump water from above the. cathedral might collapse it was a. building they didn't want to use. powerful hoses in they had to go inside. and try to put it out there was a point. at which they went into the bells Towers. to prevent them from collapsing if they. had the whole building would have gone. down so what started as a fire star by. cigarette butt was really a kind of. existential crisis for notredam and for. the world right and the question. immediately became what do you do after.

one of the world's great important. essential beloved buildings is this. badly. damaged so there were different answers. to that question and at first it wasn't. clear what would happen there were a lot. of proposals to do something C crazy on. the roof to use essentially This. calamity as an opportunity huh crazy. like what well the French prime minister.

hastily proposed that there be an. architectural competition to reimagine. the. roof that's an invitation for every. wackadoodle proposal you can imagine. Architects salivated the prospect of. such a proposal so circulating online. pretty quickly were all sorts of things. swimming pool Garden someone came up. with the idea of like a giant carbon. fiber Gold Leaf flame to replace the.

Spire whoa that's on the nose yeah it it. actually bore uncanny resemblance to the. logo for a chicken wings franchise in. Colorado um and there were a lot of. those things but relatively soon cooler. heads including some prominent French. Architects persuaded the French. government to do the right thing which. was to to restore the cathedral as it. had been and that became the.

Mission and macron the president even. while the building was still. smoldering promised that it would be. restored in 5. years which back then. seemed not just a Hail Mary it seemed. completely crazy impossible to you too. everybody I yes I thought it was nuts I. even told my editors there was. absolutely no way this would happen in 5.

years 20 years we'll check in in 10. years don't worry about this nothing. really to see here and it turns out I. was wrong. again and here we are 5 years later the. building has been reopened it's on time. on budget and it's incredible it's a. kind of miracle. [Music].

we'll be right. [Music]. back so Michael tell us how France did. this how they pulled this ontime miracle. off well the president macron assigned a. general to run the operation a me named. georan and he ran it like a military. operation they bured off the cathedral.

it meant you had essentially like a. mystery in plain sight you couldn't see. what was happening on the other side of. it they shared what information they. wanted otherwise it was really. impossible to get a look I I had wanted. to embed myself there from the beginning. to watch the process and to try to see. what was going to happen day to day cuz. I thought it' be an incredibly. interesting project to follow and uh. they certainly weren't Hing any of. that they basically told you no way they. were preoccupied and and I understand.

and they surrounded the cathedral with. this wall that told you information. about notredam and eventually showed. pictures of some of the workers but you. could never see on the other side of it. you would occasionally see you know. stuff going on in the cranes obviously. on the scaffolding but it was really. hard to know what was going on for a. long time and finally after 5 years of. begging and pleading and leaning really. heavily on our wonderful colleague. aurelan Breeden in Paris. we got the word in June we could come in.

one day next week I didn't know what. that meant whether we had an hour or 45. minutes whether we had two hours we had. that all day I didn't know who we were. seeing but I packed my bags and flew to. Paris right so this is not exactly. living inside the cathedral as you had. originally saw but you have this chance. so tell us about this one day you get to. go and side I land in Paris I meet aelan.

for breakfast nearby we walk over the. cathedral and we're told we have to. strip naked and put on basically a. hazmat suit I'm sorry what yeah um so I. was a little taken back and I asked a. couple times like naked naked. or um like French naked. or so I think what what this probably. was about was a hold over from the fact. that there had been concerns about the.

lead and uh a component of the original. construction right of the spire and the. roof and so they wanted to take. extravagant cautionary steps to make. sure everyone came in and out was not. taking lead out from the cathedral but. by this point that was a mood issue but. fine I would have done anything so I go. through a security Turn Style and enter. this container Village invisible from. the outside almost but there it is. hundreds of workers a real beehive.

we're meeting the woman who's going to. take us. around and we go to this construction. elevator and rise up to the roof which. was incredible seeing Paris in a way I'd. never seen it seeing the cathedral in a. way I'd never seen it seeing the workers. there who seem on the whole remarkably. happy call. me are you you are here a bit Yeah a.

only a an. understatement you know construction. sites are not usually happy places. particularly a lot of stress and there. was certainly a lot of stress and. concern here at deadlines but there was. a really different atmosphere a. different vibe what was it I think for. all of the stresses there was a shared. feeling of a mission people were working. on something that was bigger long longer. lasting themselves and that you know.

they were proud of that's the kind of. job I think I'm not going to do again at. least not not on this Ro yeah yeah there. there are many times when I could have. left and I haven't left yet right. why still not born they would go home at. night and you know they could say their. spouses what did you do today I I worked. on notrump what did you. do an impossible thing to match hard top. and that's something of what I felt from.

talking to some of these workers as well. there was a collegiality some of them. worked for competing firms but here they. would share Hammers and help each other. out friendly with the other company yes. we are friendly. together they were doing all sorts of. stuff they were laying down sheets of. lead they were erecting the spire and. most interestingly to me they were. rebuilding the rafters this complex of. of beams all that wood that had burned. exactly 5 years.

ago this is beautiful really. beautiful so I go through this basically. a hole in the roof and enter this Forest. of reconstructed Rafters very beautiful. these trusses that had been rebuilt and. you know it was. providential what do you mean well. before the fire. the cathedral was in disrepair the roof.

was leaking some of that wood was. rotting repairs had started on the. cathedral but also there were some. people who tried to document the. cathedral there were a couple of French. Architects who'd gone up at the rafters. and the spire and recorded every detail. of what there was down to the finest. degree and there was a Belgian scholar. who had used liar to do a digital scan. of the cathedral from all different SS. of points and gathered like a billion.

points of data it was amazing which gave. the workers a map effectively of the. cathedral down to the width of a pencil. eraser so the Reconstruction could be. extraordinarily faithful what I learned. from the workers was that each tree that. had been cut down in forests across. France had been specifically chosen to. match the peculiarity of the beam that. it would replace the medieval beam which.

had been Faithfully studied before. basically saying they they did the. opposite of what the middle-age. Carpenters did the middle-age Carpenters. they found a tree and then they worked. with that tree and they wor did the. opposite they looked at what they had. and then they had to look for a. tree exactly they had to reproduce I'm. trying to Envision people going out into. the forest of France looking at trees. and saying ah that one is Worthy of that. beam you'll remember franois in the.

rafters up there cut down that tree. exactly and then the Carpenters today. using the same sort of old hand tools. made sure that the Contours of that beam. down to all sorts of peculiarities in. the Middle Ages were exactly the same. and this wasn't just for authenticity. sake the same method yeah it's. incredible really because you're. Reviving ancient techniques mean not for. the folklore uhhuh but. also there was a reason why they had um.

800 years and um that's pretty good. exactly that's pretty good this was. because the previous beams had lasted. for 800 years huh and then they had. tattooed back into it the medieval. Carpenters original Mark and if there. had been beams that had been. reconstructed in the 19th century they. added those back too that's. extraordinary yeah it was especially. extraordinary because not just was it.

faithful but it was something that the. public will not see so it wasn't done. for tourists it was about something else. it was devotional devotional to the. original workers and the original. Mission and meaning of this entire. Cathedral exactly devotional to the. techniques that dated back really. thousands of years one of the things. that was going on here was to help to. resuscitate what are basically artisanal.

ancestral crafts and. techniques there's a group called The. compo duir which dates back to the 12th. century group of Artisans and there were. more than a thousand applications when. the decision was made to restore the. cathedral people who wanted to. participate in this project and that was. in some ways one of the most beautiful. things about notredam one of the guys. who was from that organization had said. to me that it's a reminder of the.

Dignity of Labor and of craft and I saw. that in the workers themselves because. it was not just reopening a tourist site. it was Reviving a whole culture it was. sustaining something that had lasted for. nearly a thousand years I'm curious once. you get down from the roof and you are. witnessing this exceptionally faithful. devotional effort to bring the roof back. to what it looked like a thousand years. ago what you saw on the interior. probably the best known portions of.

notredam so you know entering the. cathedral was disorienting at first. first of all it was a construction site. sill so there were you know people. moving heavy equipment and there's still. a lot of scaffolding and tarp but pretty. quickly it became clear to me what had. happened I could see suddenly that the. cathedral was spanking clean bright and. I looked up and there had been all these. famous images of the the collapsed. vaults these giant black holes in the. ceiling and now they had been repaired.

now you had a new ceiling and it was. and span and bright and this. kaleidoscopic light coming through these. stained glass wias which. survived the fire but what was also a. kind of Miracle was that that work in. creating those digital Maps before the. fire allowed the people reconstructing. it to even reproduce the sound of the. cathedral wow because every material. every angle every quality of the.

building could be reproduced. [Music]. now one of the organists who works there. spoke to me about this a building like. that is it's a kind of Organ Pipe he. said it's a volume that has a certain. pitch and quality he said D major sounds. really good in. notum and that is often what you. experience when you come in it's it's.

not just looking at things it's hearing. them to feel you're surrounded by a. particular. sound that's what I was sensing that the. soul of the building had come back in a. sense which included not just the way it. looked but the way it felt and sounded. [Music]. well that makes me wonder as an.

architecture critic did you have by the. end of this Tour by the end of this. coveted day that you got some kind of. final assessment. of the experience of this restored. Cathedral yeah Michael you know I think. at this point after nearly a thousand. years no one really needs me to. assess whether no's a good building or. not three stars yeah. honestly it's a little shocking at first.

to go in and I think some people will. experience this you know when the cine. Chapel was cleaned some decades ago. people had gotten used to looking at all. that Roman Grime and and kind of they'd. become attached to that quality of the. the Michelangelo's with covered with. dirt and and looking sort of dark and um. serious aged yeah and then Grime was. taken off and everyone thought it looked. like a Superman comic it was just so. bright now of course people have become.

accustomed to that I think there may be. some of that kind of adjustment. basically you should prepare yourself. for going inside a thousand-year-old. building that has been power washed yes. that's exactly correct but I think it. looked obviously really remarkable and I. did come away with something not just. about the building but a feeling that. the project itself represented something. very moving so few things nowadays seem. sort of unimpeachable. and just good and that was the main.

takeaway I had about this project it had. not just gone well but it seemed to be. something that brought people together. it seemed to be something people could. attribute larger meaning to well you're. getting at the question I've been. waiting to ask you this entire. conversation which is if architecture as. you have laid out here tells us. something about us what did this. renovation this project tell us about. ourselves right now well for starters it.

tells us that this is not the moment. when we Let notredam Die that we are. capable of bringing it back to life and. that's a sign of hope I mean notredam is. not going to solve everyone's problems. France is still coming apart walk down. the street you still worry about whether. there's going to be crime and. homelessness I don't want to overstate. the case but I do think notredam reminds. us that the places we build. give us the sense of community they give.

us a sense of each other the coming. together itself which is what the. cathedral is about is a sign of hope for. us it's the thing that we wish we can do. it's our best selves it's our best. selves right notrad is our best selves. and now it's in the best shape that it's. ever been in probably a thousand years. if that's not a sign of human progress. yeah and you know I met a lot of people. Parisian some friends of mine who had. never really thought much about notredam.

or actually just founded an impediment. on their way to work all the crowds and. they found themselves Crest Fallen. shocked really by how they felt when it. burned and I think that was the. realization from many people that this. building had a place in their own lives. that they hadn't even understood before. it's a touchstone for our sense of our. own changing evolving lives aging. and I think also for the passage of time.

in a larger sense over the centuries to. which we are. connected and the building's. Resurrection preserves that connection. it allows us to think we can go back we. haven't lost touch essentially with not. just with the past but with ourselves. mhm just before I left the cathedral I. was speaking with the woman who showed. us around and I asked her directly are.

you. Catholic and she said yes so I said to. her what is it meant for you to be. working on this project and she. struggled for like a minute to find the. words and then she. wept and I thought that said it all. really that for her this was also. something that. she would remember for the rest of her.

[Music]. life that she lived at this. moment for her no doubt had religious. meetings but I'd like to think is the. power of architecture and can sustain us. at a time when we are divided and we. sometimes lose. hope maybe that was the original idea. for the people who built the cathedral. nearly a thousand years.

ago oh Michael on that really beautiful. note thank you very very much thank you. Michael it's been a pleasure. [Music]. [Music].

we'll be right. back here's what else you need to know. today on Tuesday Israel said it had. destroyed Syria's Navy during a series. of air strikes in what it described as. defensive measures designed to protect. it self against Syria's new government.

but the attacks have defied warnings. from Western governments who fear they. may ignite a new conflict in the region. and fear that Israel is using the fall. of Syria's government as an opportunity. to take offensive. actions as the Assad government fell. over the weekend Israeli Ground Forces. Advanced beyond the demilitarized zone. on the Israeli Syria border marking. Israel's first overt entry into Syrian.

territory in more than 50. years today's episode was produced by. Carlos PRI and Jessica Chong it was. edited by Michael benah contains. original music by Dan Powell Pat. mccusker Marian Lozano and Diane Wong. and was engineered by Chris Wood our. theme music is by Jim brunberg and. benley FK of. wonderly special thanks to aelian.

Breeden Sean ltic and Catherine. [Music]. [Music]. Porter that's it for the daily I'm. Michael. buaro see you tomorrow. [Music].