The restoration of Saint-Hubert's
It’s Back to Basics for Saint-Hubert’s Chapel: Château Royal d’Amboise.
There is something rather wonderful going on up at the Château. In truth, there often is something rather wonderful going on, but at the moment it’s exceptionally wonderful. Les Charpentiers sans Frontières have been restoring some of the Chapel rafters. Parts of the frame, more suited to a much lighter roof, are broken because of strong winds and the weight of lead. Eighty-year old oak trees felled locally from the woods around Chanteloup have been used for the restoration.
Les Charpentiers is no ordinary group. To begin with, it’s members are volunteers, highly trained professionals from Scotland, Canada, USA, Norway, Romania, England, Poland, Estonia, Germany and Switzerland. Dedicated to the restoration of old monuments, to wood, to their craft, they work with their hands using traditional, almost forgotten ways of working.
Les Charpentiers use only the tools the original builder used but therein lies the rub. Which builder? The one in 1492? Or the restorer in 1870?
When John Ruskin painted the chapel in 1841 he wrote: The chapel... one of the loveliest bits of rich detail in France...is terminated by a small wooden spire.
In 1870, when the Château was returned to the Orleans family, the grandson of Louis Philippe put plans in motion to restore it. Because the Château is a listed building, the State appointed the Inspector of Historic Monuments, Victor Ruprich-Robert as architect.
Did he give it a new roof with all those finials and furbelows? He certainly replaced the small wooden spire with the present flamboyant one. This is typical of Victorian architects who embellished historic buildings according to their own fancy. It comes as no surprise to learn he was a pupil of the infamous Eugène Viollet-le-Duc. Infamous because his peer group condemned his restorations as historically incorrect figments of his imagination.
Ruprich-Robert gave the chapel a belfry. Did the bell ever ring? Someone called it Hildegarde. Who? Did the original 1492 have one? No matter. Even if historically incorrect it will be a joy to hear it join the carillon of Saint-Denis and the Clock Tower. There is something rather wonderful about waking up to bells. Those in Amboise make the town even more special than it already is.
Post by Pamela, photography by Mark.
