Paris. In the aftermath of the fire which ravaged Notre-Dame in 2019, the sum promised to save the cathedral could seem excessive, reaching more than 840 million euros. Five years later, the generous envelope proved almost too thin to complete the entire renovation. The question of a potential remainder after work has however animated debates, since 2019, when certain construction economists capped the needs of the burned cathedral at around 600 million euros. Directing the remaining donations towards local communities, or towards small rural religious buildings, these hypotheses then formulated – perilous from the point of view of patronage legislation – no longer have any reason to exist today.
“Phase 3” resumes the pre-2019 projects
At the end of the second phase of the project, there remains a surplus of 140 million euros: a situation anticipated by the public establishment Rebâtir Notre-Dame de Paris, which had accurately sized the budget for the security projects (€150 million) and renovation (€550 million). But this sum has a clear destination, in continuation of the rescue work carried out for five years. “Phase 3” must resume the exterior restoration projects interrupted by the 2019 fire, including the urgent consolidation of the apse and its flying buttresses. When the fire ravaged the cathedral, it was engaged in a long restoration program led by the chief architect of Historical Monuments Philippe Villeneuve. Focusing mainly on the exterior of the monument, this project was to complete it in around ten years. In 2017, a framework agreement linking the Notre-Dame Foundation and the State made it possible to envisage, to carry out the restoration, regular funding of 6 million euros per year, combining patronage and public investment and giving hope for a total of 60 million euros over ten years. To completely complete this program, the total sum envisaged was then 150 million euros over twenty years.
This sum now corresponds more or less to the financing of a single part of the exterior renovation, that of the consolidation and reconstruction of the flying buttresses of the bedside as well as the restoration of the sculptures. Absorbing the entire remaining 140 million euros, and scheduled from 2025 to 2028, this third project was the subject of special agreements with the major donors of the cathedral, who are the sole financiers of this phase. But to complete the exterior renovation of Notre-Dame, the collecting organizations will once again have to solicit the generosity of their donors: “On the scale of a historical monument, nothing is ever finishedspecifies Sylvie Bretones, general delegate of the Notre-Dame Foundation, one of the five institutions authorized to collect donations for the cathedral. We will also continue to collect in 2025, to finance the work of the sacristy and the presbytery. »
Renovation of the sacristy currently unfunded
Renovated inside, the sacristy presents a worrying sanitary condition on its outside, which Philippe Villeneuve described as “catastrophic” before the fire. This 19th century building, the work of Viollet-le-Duc, will not, however, benefit from the first subscription, the remainder of which has already been mobilized for the apse of the cathedral. For the collecting organizations (Fondation Notre-Dame, Fondation du patrimoine, Fondation de France, Center des monuments nationaux, as well as the public establishment Rebâtir Notre-Dame), December 7 does not mark the end of the project, but the beginning of a new call for generosity.
Remobilizing donors is a challenge. If the Notre-Dame Foundation had no difficulty in raising 358 million euros in the weeks following the fire, it was less easy for the 7 million euros of its second subscription, relating to the financing of interior fittings of the cathedral (furniture, sound, signage, reservation system, etc.). “It was a real challenge to collect for the interior fittings, we had to do education to make people understand that the cathedral still needs donations,” recalls Sylvie Bretones.
For collecting organizations, education must also focus on the limits to the use of subscription: the 843 million raised in the post-fire emergency can only be allocated to the conservation and restoration of the cathedral, as provided for in the national subscription law. The creation of a new reliquary, furniture, stained glass windows, or the design of the various tools for using the monument cannot benefit from this windfall. Just like the surroundings of the cathedral, an urban project entirely financed by the City of Paris.
The “museum of the work” project is falling by the wayside
In its 2022 report, the Court of Auditors also encouraged the return of the State, in the form of the 2017 framework agreement which it considered virtuous: the State then committed to paying 1 euro for each euro collected by the Notre-Dame Foundation, within the limit of 2 million per year. The budgetary context, however, is not favorable to this hypothesis, and it could even be right for the project of a “museum of the work of Notre-Dame”, announced by the President of the Republic in December 2023. The financing of such museum cannot in fact benefit from general subscription, “and it was never discussed in any of our meetings”assures the general delegate of the Foundation. Despite a preliminary report presented in the spring before the National Assembly by the director of the National Heritage Institute, Charles Personnaz, and the scientific manager of Rebâtir Notre-Dame, Jonathan Truillet, this place which would combine an interpretation center and presentation collections relating to the monument is not a priority for the Ministry of Culture. The fate of this museum also remains dependent on that of its natural location, within the Hôtel-Dieu adjoining the cathedral, for which the Assistance publique-Hôpitaux de Paris – its current owner – has not yet decided anything. Once again, the situation could be resolved by appealing to donors, particularly foreign ones, who were attentive during the presentation of this hypothetical museum.
