Paris - Notre Dame's Beauty Post Fire

Notre Dame was cleaned as it was restored

Back to writing about Paris as I've so many more things to say about my trip!

After we visited Musee d'Orsay, we went to Notre Dame. Unfortunately traffic was a mess because of road construction, so our Uber inched around the block like a snail. For us the benefit was being able to have a short nap in a 20-minute ride that should have taken five minutes.

The cathedral was crawling with tourists

When we arrived, there was a massive line in front of the basilica, but because we had timed tickets, we pretty much walked in. The tickets are free, but can only be booked at most a day in advance. Visitors are also warned not to wear shorts above the knee and shoulders should not be bare.

However, depending on the security guard, some sleeveless tourists were able to go through, while others were given temporary shawls to cover themselves. Shorts of all lengths seemed to have no problem getting in.

Once we were inside, the place was crawling with tourists, and every few minutes a pre-recorded male voice on a loop would make a shhhh sound and plead for silence; it mostly went unheeded.

We were really interested in visiting the Notre Dame following the horrific fire in April 2019 that destroyed the cathedral's wooden spire and most of the wooden roof which caused extensive damage inside. While the three rose windows were undamaged, some lead joints in some 19th century stained glass windows melted.

The rose windows were undamaged

French President Emmanuel Macron announced a five-year timeline to complete the restoration of the Notre Dame (in time for the Paris Olympics), with donors pledging over 840 million euros. The cathedral was re-opened in December 2024, with restorers still working on a few stained glass windows (which were temporarily covered up).

After the fire there was discussion of whether to restore Notre Dame to what it looked like before or to modernise it, but because the building is a Unesco World Heritage site, the cathedral had to be reconstruct it like before.

It gave restorers an assignment of doing trades from centuries before, of which only a few experts have experience. Nevertheless it was still a beautiful experience to be in the cathedral; if the scaffolding in some parts were not there, you would not have known it had suffered damage. In fact the restorers took advantage of Notre Dame's closure to clean it, and so it looks brighter than it was before.