Notre-Dame-du-Travail is a Roman Catholic church located at 59 rue Vercingetorix in the 14th arrondissement of Paris. It was built between 1897 and 1902 for the largely working-class population It is notable particularly for its innovative exposed steel framework in the interior, in contrast to the more traditional exterior. The entire church was registered as an historic monument on July 5, 2016.
History
A small chapel built in 1848, had preceded the present church, when the vilage was still just outside the city limits of Paris, surrounded by wheat fields. and had a population of two thousand. After the Gare de l'Ouest railway station (now Gare Montparnasse) was built, the neighborhood was renamed Plaisance, and became an industrial center, and the working class population grew rapidly. The Plaisance parish was annexed to Paris in 1860, and, as the population grew, the chapel was enlarged with a third traverse. In 1870, when the city was besieged by the Prussians during the Franco-Prussian War, the church was used as a hospital. During the Paris Commune in 1871, the church was briefly confiscated and the priest imprisoned.
As the population of the neighborhood grew, the church was soon overcrowded. In 1884 the Vicar, Father Roger Soulange-Bodin, organized a national campaign to raise funds for a new and bigger church. He wrote, "Why a church? To unite in a religious setting the workers lof all classes. Why Paris? Because Paris is correctly considered the center of labor and industry. Why the Plaisance quarter? Because it is a unique neighborhood inhabited uniquely of workers, which at present does not have a church for its thirty-five thousand inhabitants."
The initial funds were raised, and construction began. The architect was (1862–1955), who had also built in the 13th arrondissement. The work was delayed by high costs, and Soulange-Bodin had to raise more funds to complete it. He was obliged to donate the rest of his personal fortune to finish the work. With the help of donations from local businesses and industrial enterprises, the church was finally completed in April 1902. Restoration and modifications took place in the 1960s and 1970s
Exterior
The exterior of the church, facing Square du Cardinal-Wyszynski, is in the neo-Romanesque style, giving little hint of the modern features of the interior.
A notable work of art on the exterior is found in the tympanum over the portal. "The Virgin and Child" was painted in the neo-Byzantine style by Genevieve and Henri Taillefert at the beginning of the 20th century.
The Bell of Sevastopol and the Carillon
The facade is flanked by octagonal towers on either side. One tower also serves as a bell tower. It holds a large bell, brought to Paris from Sevastopol as a trophy at the end of the Crimean War, in 1854. The victorious French general Patrice de Mac Mahon took five bells from the cathedral and brought them to France as war trophies. Four of the bells were given to the Cathedral of Notre-Dame de Paris (where they are on display in a corridor) and the fifth was given to Notre-Dame du Travail, before its reconstruction. In 1865 the Emperor Napoleon III and the Empress Eugenie personally presented the bell to the church . The bell weighs 551 kilograms, and is 100 centimeters in diameter and 94 centimeters high. When the church moved to its present location, it was found that the bell was too heavy for the tower, and it was placed in the garden, where it remained until 1976. when it was transferred to new concrete structure built on top of the old stairway tower.
In addition the Bell of Sebastopol, the church has a carillon with four bells placed on the roof. It plays a brief melody of six notes (re-sharp,do-sharp, si, do-sharp,re-sharp,sol-sharp) every quarter hour.
Interior
The church is fifty-nine meters long and twenty-five meters high. The central part of the nave 9.5 meters wide and twenty meters high, up to the steel ribs of the vault. The most prominent features of the interior are the two rows of steel columns which divide the church into a central aisle and two collateral aisles. The collateral aisles are lined with small chapels. lined with with the nave flanked by arcades and support the arches of the ceiling and the collateral aisles, replacing the traditional stone columns of earlier churches. Astruc deliberately made the interior look industrial, so that "it would call to the mind of the worker his factory, surrounded by a familiar milieu."