Notre Dame Cathedral Unveils Its New Interior 5 Years After Devastating Fire

The Associated Press
By The Associated Press
November 29, 2024France
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Notre Dame Cathedral Unveils Its New Interior 5 Years After Devastating Fire
The nave, the western Rose window and the organ of Notre-Dame de Paris cathedral are seen while French President Emmanuel Macron visits the restored interiors of the monument, in Paris on Nov. 29, 2024. (Stephane de Sakutin/Pool via AP)

PARIS—After more than five years of frenetic, but sometimes interrupted, reconstruction work, Notre Dame Cathedral showed itself anew to the world Friday, with rebuilt soaring ceilings and creamy good-as-new stonework erasing somber memories of its devastating fire in 2019.

Images broadcast live of a site visit by French President Emmanuel Macron showed the inside of the iconic cathedral as worshippers might have experienced it in previous centuries, its wide, open spaces filled with bright light on a crisp and sunny winter’s day that lit up the vibrant colors of the stained glass windows.

Outside, the monument is still a construction site, with scaffolding and cranes. But the renovated interior—shown in its full glory Friday for the first time before the public is allowed back in on Dec. 8—proved to be breathtaking.

Stonemasons Fixed Ripped-Open Ceilings

Gone are the gaping holes that the blaze tore into the vaulted ceilings, leaving charred piles of debris. New stonework has been carefully pieced together to repair and fill the wounds that had left the cathedral’s insides exposed to the elements. Delicate golden angels look on from the centerpiece of one of the rebuilt ceilings, seeming to fly again above the transept.

The cathedral’s bright, cream-colored limestone walls look brand new, cleaned not only of dust from the fire but also of grime that had accumulated for centuries.

The cathedral attracted millions of worshippers and visitors annually before the April 15, 2019, fire forced its closure and turned the monument in the heart of Paris into a no-go zone except to artisans, architects and others mobilized for the reconstruction.

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A view of the Notre-Dame cathedral in Paris, on Nov.29, 2024. (Christophe Petit Tesson, Pool via AP)
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People stroll in Notre-Dame de Paris cathedral in Paris, on Nov.29, 2024. (Christophe Petit Tesson, Pool via AP)

Techniques New and Old Deployed

Powerful vacuum cleaners were used to first remove toxic dust released when the fire melted the cathedral’s lead roofs.

Fine layers of latex were then sprayed onto the surfaces and removed a few days later, taking dirt away with them from the stones’ pores, nooks and crevices. In all, 42,000 square meters of stonework were cleaned and decontaminated—an area equivalent to roughly six soccer pitches.

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A hole is seen in the dome inside Notre Dame cathedral after the fire in Paris on April 16, 2019. (Christophe Petit Tesson/Pool via AP)

“It feels like it was built yesterday, like it’s just been born, even though Notre Dame is very old,” said stonemason Adrien Willeme, who worked on the reconstruction. “Because it’s been so carefully restored and cleaned, it looks really extraordinary.”

Cleaning gels were also used on some walls that had been painted, removing many years of accumulated dirt and revealing their bright colors once again.

Carpenters worked by hand like their medieval counterparts as they hewed giant oak beams to rebuild the roof and spire that collapsed like a flaming spear into the inferno. The beams show the marks of the carpenters’ handiwork, with dents made on the woodwork by their hand axes.

Some 2,000 oak trees were felled to rebuild roof frameworks so dense and intricate that they are nicknamed “the forest.”

Sneak Peek ahead of Reopening

Macron’s visit kicked off a series of events ushering in the reopening of the 12th-century Gothic masterpiece. At the end of his tour, the president addressed hundreds of workers gathered inside the cathedral and thanked them for their labors on what he called the “building site of the century.”

“The shock of the reopening will, I want to believe, be as powerful as the one of the fire. But it will be a shock of hope,” he said. “The inferno of Notre Dame was a wound for the nation. And you were its remedy.”

Macron will return on Dec. 7 to deliver another address and will attend the consecration of the new altar during a solemn Mass the following day.

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The nave of the Notre-Dame de Paris cathedral is seen while French President Emmanuel Macron visited the restored interiors of the monument in Paris, on Nov. 29, 2024. (Sarah Meyssonnier/Pool via AP)
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The choir stalls of Notre-Dame de Paris cathedral are seen while French President Emmanuel Macron visits the restored interiors of the monument in Paris, on Nov. 29, 2024. (Stephane de Sakutin/Pool via AP)
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Part of the facade of Notre-Dame Cathedral is seen in Paris, on Nov., 29 2024. (Christophe Petit Tesson/Pool via AP)
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A man takes a picture of Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, on Nov. 29, 2024. (Michel Euler/AP Photo)

By Thomas Adamson and John Leicester