Looking for the cathedral of Evry

[Deleted]

The cathedral of Evry in the outer suburbs of Paris has a very special distinction: it is the only cathedral that was built in France in the 20th century. Plans to build the cathedral first began in 1988 and the cornerstone was finally laid at Easter 1991 although construction did not actually begin until July 1992. It was partially finished and started being used by April 1995, and it was officially inaugurated in 1996. Since the first new cathedral in more than a century in France was a big deal, Pope John Paul II came for an official visit on 22 August 1997.

The architect was Mario Botta, who also designed the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. It is officially said to be of Byzantine inspiration because it is circular, and the construction material was quite unusual for the Paris metropolitan area: Toulouse brick. Bricks were chosen as being the communion of the four elements: made from water and earth, dried by air and baked in fire. I rather like this kind of symbolism.

Naturally there was controversy. Can there be religion without controversy? I think not. The fact that the building is circular was considered to be a heresy by some, who think that all cathedrals must be built in the form of a cross. Also, the fact that the government paid for part of it was considered inadmissible in secular France. The cathedral cost 90 million francs, and the state provided 13 million francs, using a little trick that it learned to do over the years. There is a totally separate museum of sacred art in the building, which justifies the participation of the Ministry of Culture. The same trick was used in my own neighbourhood just last year when the city of Paris built the Centre for Islamic Cultures for about 13 million euros. It contains a mosque on one floor, which absolutely cannot be financed by public funds. So the city sold one floor of the building to the local Muslim authorities for 2.5 million euros to do as they pleased. The are entrances on two different streets to the building, and on Friday the faithful enter through the "other" door so that the "municipal" part of the building is not used for religious activity. Right now the rest of the building is having an exhibition of Syrian art created during the civil war.

Okay, back to Evry. Things started out wrong, because I took the wrong train! At Gare du Nord, the RER D train indicator said "Evry" and that was good enough for me. Or at least I thought so until the train arrived at Evry Val de Seine or a spur line when I really wanted to go to Evry Courcouronnes.

It wasn't really a problem since Evry is not the biggest city in the world (pop. 52,184) and I figured that I could walk from one side to the other without difficulty. It's a shame it was raining, though, because for once I didn't bother to bring an umbrella. When I bring an umbrella, it never rains. This side of town was very green and calm and did not at all fit the common perception that Evry is a rough suburb.

This is obviously not the cathedral!



Lots of towns have these signs that show the direction of foreign cities with which they have been twinned.



This sign was more useful to me.



This part of town is a bedroom community. Here is what a bedroom community street looks like.



In spite of the rain, it was not an unpleasant walk.



From the footpath, you can see that walking is not the preferred method of transportation in the area.



I was getting closer to my goal. I think that the municipal gardening is excellent in this town.

[Deleted]

Well, I'm glad that I arrived at the wrong station in Evry because otherwise I would not have seen the Khánh Anh pagoda as I rounded the corner.





It is a Vietnamese Buddhist pagoda, the foundations of which were laid only in 2002. The Dalai Lama inaugurated it in 2008.



I kept turning back to look at it as I arrived in the "new town" of Evry.



The difference from the old town is manifest.



I finally crossed the "correct" rail line that I would take to get back to Paris.



New towns have really excellent bicycle paths.



Most Parisians are afraid to come to Evry because of its reputation. More on that later.





I wanted to know more about this building but didn't have time the inclination to stray from my path in the rain.



This abandoned restaurant needs to be demolished as soon as possible.



The central core of the new town of Evry is all built out of Toulouse brick. Here is the Chamber of Commerce.





And this is the town hall.

[Deleted]

Right next to the mairie is the cathedral.





I glanced back at the main square before searching for the entrance.



Here is the official name of the cathedral.



The trees on the roof are a very nice touch.





I wondered if the spiral path to the roof was open to the public.



Anyway, I was there too early! I would have to come back after it opened. I kept walking around the building.





There is a hotel directly across from the cathedral and the town hall, respecting the architectural style and materials.



Here is the train station where I had planned to arrive.





The group on the right were actually Americans.



In case you are wondering how far the train station is from the cathedral, this should answer your question.

[fumobici]

Nice, so far. Doesn't look too scary yet either, in fact quite civilized. The cathedral is far more interesting than the SFMOMA, which while nice enough inside doesn't really evoke much admiration from the limited viewpoints one can see it from in its rather claustrophobic setting. I can't help but think of the Torre Guinigi in Lucca looking at the round structure with the trees.

[mossie]

Well that is certainly a different take on a cathedral. I like the trees on the roof, what happens if a gale blows?? I hope they have good roots

[htmb]

I would love to explore this area to see the architecture. I've always been fascinated by rooftop plantings, especially trees as large as the ones on top if the cathedral, and I love red brick. Interesting report, so far. Nice of you to brave the rain.

[questa]

Years ago I heard a theory that the tall imposing structures in a civilisation showed what was the dominant "God" of the era.

Thus many of the high fortresses and city walls showed warrior nations, steeples and high church buildings showed the power of the church. These were outgrown by the skyscrapers showing the rise of the worship of money etc.

This cathedral marks a new move...it is big enough to be imposing, but friendly with its neighbours. The high places are a return to the natural environment with the trees actually over the worshippers heads when they are inside. The blending of the elements in the bricks add to it.

I like to think that this may be a beginning of a new era.

[bjd]

As much as I like the trees on the roof, I'm always worried that the architects have not made the structure solid enough and when the roots grow or it gets waterlogged, it will all collapse.

Of course they used Toulouse bricks! The colour is much warmer than the bricks used in northern France. But it definitely all looks nice -- it would have been much sadder-looking if they had used concrete for the church and the buildings around it.

I am surprised that they built a cathedral at this time (when so few French go to church -- what is the number? 10%) and in a place with such a young population (not the highest demographic of churchgoers). And Evry has been run by the left forever, so not very "churchy" either.

[Deleted]

I just think they are lucky so far that none of the trees has died. The photo showing the closeup of the spiral staircase would seem to indicate that they have left sufficient depth for the trees to reach full maturity. And I would hope that both the bottom and the sides are protected by steel plates. I'm sure that we have all seen examples of how tree roots can crack annoying bricks and push them out of the way over the years. It is not impossible that the architect guaranteed this landscaping design for 30 years or so and figured that someone else will have to worry about what to do whenever something needs to be done. And since we don't live in a perfect world, it is also quite likely that visitors in the year 2114 will be telling their children "they say there used to be trees up on the roof of that shopping mall."

[Deleted]

Going out the opposite end of the train station, I was in the "problem" side of town.



The buildings from the 1970's and 80's have not aged well at all.

This area is the "agora," a vast open space between the train station and the shopping mall. It serves as a place for teenagers and other useless scoundrels to congregate. Actually, there was only one event that scared Parisians and other genteel residents of France, and it happened about 15 years ago. One Saturday afternoon, two rival gangs from different suburbs supposedly had a 'battle' here over a girl or a wrong look. The police arrived and made them scatter. Many ran into the shopping mall, which of course disrupted consumerism, never a good thing for a town's reputation. Fifteen years later, everybody still remembers the headlines from that day which were not presented as a minor scuffle but instead something like "Gang Warfare Terrorizes City!!!"

Evry has paid the price ever since. Naturally, the "social housing" part of town has all of the usual problems and quite a few of the buildings from the 70's and 80's have already been torn down as the town planners understood what their worst mistakes were, the main one being to try to cram too many people into too small a space. About half of the 'Pyramides' zone was demolished to make it less dense, which makes me understand that I was just as mistaken as everybody else -- I visited Evry (about 38 years ago!) when all of this had just been built, and I thought it looked terrific. The architecture was very innovative and it looked like a fantastic place to live. Some day I might find my old slides of my visit there which will show when the past looked like the future.

Anyway, I strolled into the shopping mall just to see how it has fared. The outside of the building has seen better days, but the inside looked just fine to me.

       

       

       

For a place that is 40 years old, it is in much better shape than a lot of other malls that were built back then. And if it were really in decline, stores like Galeries Lafayette would have pulled out long ago.

[patricklondon]

Interesting.

For whatever town-twinning is worth, fearful Parisians might be comforted to know that Bexley, if not the poshest of the outer London boroughs, is equally far from the nightmare "banlieue" image (though it has had its problems with our own local racists and neo-fascists).

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[Deleted]

This is one of the areas rebuilt in the late 90's to replace the previous generation of buildings.



Evry is the préfecture of the department of Essonne so the administrative building is one of the oldest 'modern' ones.



The mosque opened in 1994, just a few months before the cathedral.



And then it was time to go back to see the inside of the cathedral.









This small secondary basement chapel is probably totally sufficient for the weekday services.



No, there was no access to the spiral stairs to the roof. It was time to take the train back to Paris.

[questa]

Thanks for this report, Kerouac2. I have found it very interesting...I think the interior of the cathedral is beautiful with the stunning brickwork and timber teaming so well.

[htmb]

This is an interesting report. It strikes me that, as large as the cathedral seems from the outside due to its height, I suppose, the inside doesn't appear to hold an enormous crowd. I assume the seating is fixed "bench," though the rows are carved to look like separate chairs. Unusual for France, no? Did you take a look at the museum, Kerouac? Do you know if there's an entry fee?

[Deleted]

Yes, the inside is really tiny compared to the big gothic cathedrals. The seats looked incredibly uncomfortable to me.

No, I didn't visit the museum.

[gabriele]

I think if I had to have a religous affiliation (I know, it would never happen in France) I would choose to be Buddhist...a much more interesting place than the new cathedral. How fourtunate you came across it!
It strikes me (all those hard brick walls reminded me too much of the Albi cathedral and the fight against the cathars, hence the choice of the verb) that there is nothing RC about the place.
There are no kneelers and it appears there is really no room to kneel if some very observant person wanted to.
I hate to think what the acoustics in the large or small rooms are. Definitely not a place one would want to go for an organ concert...

I remember when SF MoMA was located in the Veteran's Memorial building (next to what at the time was the home of the SF Symphony and Opera. Went to a couple exhibits there. Not a good location...but the new building left me quite cold. And at the time (one hopes their collection has gotten better) I found no reason to go back to visit (by that time I'd moved from SF).
I think it was the Today Show that used to have a hand painted sign of each day's date...
August 29, 2014 (as example). Some genius with the museum decided that the sign for the day of the big earthquake (Loma Prieta) was a worthwhile archetypal artifact that deserved to be on display in SF MoMA...and was.
The museum is currently closed (since 2013) for renovation and expansion. One hopes it improves with all that money thrown at it.
I agree it is in a cramped environment but then I've found few modern buildings that I respect (let alone like) so enough on that place.
On the subject of modern cathedrals (and I do love the gothics), I think the New Saint Mary's Cathedral is quite awesome (in the best sense of the word) even after all the years since its construction.
It's not big on most visitors' agendas but there are a lot of foreign visitors so it has its fans...
Here's a couple links
www.aviewoncities.com/sf/stmaryscathedral.htm
www.greatbuildings.com/buildings/St_Marys_Cathedral_SF.html

To walk into it...because there are no interior walls, I felt I was being drawy up by all the vertical movements expressed in the exterior walls and the supports. I went for a concert and the acoustics were very good.
In comparison, the 'new' cathedral (Nuestra Senora des Los Angeles) is...well..it reminds me of an armadillo...I won't even go there for free concerts.

There is a wonderful website in the UK called Ship of Fools...and one of the things it does is have Mystery Worshipers visit various religious institutions and then report on the experience.
Probably no photos (or few) but for those who like to explore churches, it's worth a visit (and don't miss the Gadgets for God department either...
shipoffools.com/mystery/

And the Buddhist temple? When finished it will be the largest in Europe...(when finished...)
www.bouddhisme-universite.org/node/701
and it seems (another site) they don't allow visitors. Too bad.
Thanks for another great shared adventure...

[lagatta]

St. Mary's of San Francisco is striking, but is the vulva form deliberate? Of course, the Marian cult has often been seen as a Catholic recuperation or expression of the cult of the Mother Goddess.

I also really like the type of red brick used in these buildings.

Too bad the Pyramides didn't function. In some cultures and settings, highrise housing functions very well, elsewhere no. There don't seem to be any balconies on most of the newer housing. Unless they are on the inner, courtyard, side of the apartments.

Indeed Evry has a bad reputation. So it all came down to a squabble between youth gangs?

[bixaorellana]

I have never seen this thread before, and in fact only found it by accident. What a lucky accident, too, as I'm fresh from admiring all the wonderful brick structures in the Toulouse area.

The cathedral is a fascinating building, but leaves me with the impression that it was built with the idea of eventually deconsecrating it and putting it to use as the auditorium it so clearly really is. Every bit of religious iconography is proportionately tiny and looks designed to be removed. The pews are so awful that, when the day of decommisioning comes, the parishioners will probably be happy to vengefully pull them out.

Really, though, it's a lovely thing, inside and out. I suspect the acoustics are superb because of the sort of "waffle" design of the walls. Certainly the structure fits perfectly with the surrounding buildings.

This is a most interesting report, not least because of the social history included in it.

[Deleted]

Even though the church built only one cathedral in France in the 20th century, they have already built another new one in this century, inaugurated last year. Since it is also in the suburbs of Paris, I might go take a look at it one of these days.

As an idea of how incredibly temporary modern architecture is compared to all of the 500-1000 year old churches dotting the landscape, the new cathedral replaced a church that was built in 1976 (and which was upgraded to cathedral in 1987). During construction, services were housed in one of those fabric structures like they put over tennis courts in our cold countries.