Husband (architect and engineer) pointed out that whoever the contractor on this Notre Dame renovation was, they're legally and financially fucked now. That got me curious about the firm ... which led to some old articles and, oh man, the aftermath of this is gonna be messy ...
In 2017, Time published a story about how the cathedral needed renovations desperately. But nobody could agree who should be paying for it. The government owns the building and leases it to the Church for free. But church is supposed to cover upkeep ...
Read this ... it's pretty clear both church and state were already pissed at each other about Notre Dame's condition before renovations even began. time.com/4876087/notre-…
Interesting side digression in here around the 19th century renovations that were done fast and sloppy basically because Victor Hugo made Notre Dame famous all of a sudden and it needed to look a little better for tourists.
The result of that: Back in 1992, people were worrying about Notre Dame's structural integrity because the 19th century renovation had involved sealing joints with cement -- which allows water intrusion, which allows limestone to disintegrate nytimes.com/1992/04/09/wor…
A private charity was still raising money for the urgent (and massively underfunded) renovation of Notre Dame last October thebostonsun.com/2018/10/15/res…
Vice News video from last year says the flying buttresses were starting to shift, threatening the structural integrity of Notre Dame. news.vice.com/en_us/article/…
Basically, there is going to be a shitstorm of blame and political/legal wrangling around the burning of Notre Dame. (And the building was already in pretty rough shape, which is probably contributing to what happens now as it's burning.)
Also I still haven't found a source talking about what contracting companies were involved in the renovation of Notre Dame. I assume that's specialized historic restoration firms? But who knows. Holler if you see something. I'm not working on a story, I'm just weird and obsessive
Also, this is gonna tie into nationalist politics in Europe. The fallout from Notre Dame burning isn't just going to be about a cathedral.
https://twitter.com/vf3975/status/1117886444503060480
Check out this for some history on how nationalist movements in France and Italy have used historic preservation as a part of their platform in the past. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.111…
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