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The Miraculous Resurrection of Notre-Dame
How an army of artisans on a five-year deadline turned back time to restore a centuries-old masterpiece—by hand.
About an hour after his arrival, Fromont, with thousands of Parisians at the scene and millions watching around the world, looked on as the 750-ton spire, made of 1,230 oak beams, blazed, teetered, snapped like a matchstick, and crashed through the roof. It exemplified a then revolutionary new Gothic architectural style characterized by soaring vaults, ornamental ceilings that joined together several arches; stained glass windows; flying buttresses; and a light-filled nave (the central part of a church, where the congregation sits) and choir (which provides seating for the clergy and faced east, toward Jerusalem). Known in French as the charpente, it was an ingenious assemblage of triangular-shaped trusses, each one consisting of horizontal and vertical beams and diagonal rafters designed to support the heavy roof cover and distribute the weight over the walls beneath it.
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