MONTREAL — Five years ago, Notre-Dame Cathedral erupted in flames. A column of smoke rose above the Paris skyline as the historic cathedral, which took 182 years to build between the 12th and 14th centuries, was reduced to a smouldering shell.
Yet against all odds, the Gothic masterpiece is reopening its doors on Saturday — and two Canadian blacksmiths played a role in its restoration.
Over four months in the fall of 2022, Collette and a team of seven young blacksmiths under his direction forged three different types of axe — 60 axes altogether. The axes were quickly distributed to carpenters who needed the tools to carve the roof’s timber frame, doing their best to mimic the original construction.
Collette, 49, has been working as a blacksmith for more than 30 years. In 1994, he moved to southwest France to apprentice under master blacksmiths, returning to Quebec in 1998. He soon opened his own foundry with the help of his father. Over the years, he has visited Notre-Dame several times, stopping to marvel at its"incredible" door hinges.
The day after the cathedral burned in April 2019, French President Emmanuel Macron decreed that Notre-Dame would rise again in just five years — a deadline that at first even daunted the chief architect behind of the rebuild, Philippe Villeneuve. A month after the fire, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau visited Paris and offered Canadian steel and lumber to France to help with the restoration.
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