Historic Churches 2019

BCD SPECIAL REPORT ON HISTORIC CHURCHES 26 TH ANNUAL EDITION 27 to see the balance of issues falling in favour of one particular conclusion. What’s important is that future decisions affecting historic buildings are better informed. Is it better to compromise a building’s original fabric to protect its overall structure and heritage from complete destruction, or to run the risk? RECONSTRUCTION Soon after the fire was extinguished, President Macron pledged that Notre Dame will be repaired and rebuilt in five years. He launched an international funding campaign to help make this happen, which has since raised hundreds of millions of pounds in donations from individuals and organisations including L’Oreal and luxury goods conglomerate LVMH. Although the president favoured incorporating new design in the reconstruction, the French Senate subsequently passed a bill requiring that the reconstruction be faithful to the ‘last known visual state’ of the building, including Viollet-le- Duc’s spire, and that any use of new materials will need to be justified. It is perhaps needless to say that five years is a worryingly short time to undertake a sensitive and well-informed conservation project on such a large scale. The archaeological investigation and recording of all the debris in the building survey could take a substantial portion of this time, and until the investigation phase is completed it will not be clear how much of the masonry structure will need to be rebuilt. Often during such projects structural and technical issues can reveal themselves as works progress, causing unforeseen delays and complications and raising the cost of the project and the length of time needed for completion. Another factor to be considered is the shortage of specialists available with the appropriate expertise needed to work on repairing, reconstructing and conserving historic buildings like Notre Dame. No doubt experts from the UK and around the world will be brought in to assist. SALUTARY LESSONS At a time when fewer people are attending church services, it is important that we learn from this tragedy that we must maintain and properly manage historic places of worship. In the UK our rich legacy of historic churches and cathedrals must be better recognised as jewels in our cultural landscape, and their protection and conservation cannot be left to their congregations and worshippers alone. Although fire captures the imagination far better than the slow deterioration and decay of historic buildings, the result is the same, and both funding and skills to help manage and prevent this are in short supply. Further Reading For more on the importance of emergency planning in historic buildings, see Simon Kincaid’s article at BuildingConservation.com Amaud Siad, ‘There are no trees in France that are big enough to rebuild Notre Dame’s roof’, CNN World , 2019, https:// cnn.it/2Msne38 Ashley Collman, ‘Notre Dame officials chose not to install fire safety upgrades that could have limited the devastating blaze’, Business Insider , 2019, http://bc- url.com/fire-safety-upgrade Fire Protection Association, ‘The Fire Protection Association statement on the fire at Notre Dame cathedral’ 2019, http:// bc-url.com/fire-protection-association Frances Perraudin, ‘Notre Dame: How to save an iconic building from a fire’, The Guardian, 2019, http://bc-url.com/ notre-dame-restoration Historic England, ‘Writing an Emergency Response Plan’, 2019, http://bc-url.com/ fire-response-plan Katrin Bennhold and James Glanz, ‘Notre Dame’s safety planners underestimated the risk, with devastating results’, The New York Times , 2019, https://nyti.ms/2XzxeZt JONATHAN TAYLOR and FELICITY FOX are members of the Cathedral Communications editorial team which produces publications including the Building Conservation Directory . The fire at Notre Dame Cathedral (pictured after the fire was extinguished) underlines the importance of protecting our historic buildings from disaster by installing fire protection systems and having emergency planning procedures in place. (Photo: Louis HG - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, http://bc-url.com/notre-dame )

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