Ronchamp Chapel

Le Corbusier – Ronchamp Chapel-Chapelle Notre Dame du Haut, Ronchamp France, 1950-1955

Notre-Dame du Haut is a chapel located in Ronchamp, near Belfort in France designed by the architect Le Corbusier according to the canons of brutalist architecture. It is considered one of the most famous examples of modern religious architecture.
Designed starting in 1950, the first stone was laid on April 4, 1954 and the church was completed on June 20, 1955, blessed on June 25, 1955, and consecrated on September 11, 2005.

The building, located on the top of a mountain, is made of reinforced concrete. It consists of a single nave of irregular shape. On the sides of the nave there are three small independent chapels that end in three semi-cylindrical bell towers. The roof of the church is made with a concrete casting modeled as if it were a large inverted sail.

To increase the sense of lightness of the whole, the roof does not rest directly on the walls, but on short pillars sunk in the walls. In this way, observing the ceiling from the inside, one perceives a blade of light that penetrates between the walls and the concrete sail, as if it could almost fly away at any moment.

Light also enters through dozens of openings of the most varied shapes. Slits, windows, glass and sunshades that determine suggestive light effects enhanced by the contrast between the white of the plaster and the dirty grey of the cement. The comparison, proposed by Pierre Guéguen, between these slits and the cuts that Lucio Fontana began to make a few years later in his canvases: “Rencontre de luminaristes en des arts differents” is bold and interesting. The church was designed to be used also outside, where, under the large roof, there is an altar and a pulpit. The building can accommodate about 200 people.

“I wanted to create a place of silence, of prayer, of peace, of inner joy,” said Le Corbusier on the day of the inauguration.
Source: Wikipedia