Amiens Cathedral
Amiens has the largest medieval church interior in France. The nave is 42 metres high and was built quickly, so the cathedral is unusually unified. It is regarded as the classic model of High Gothic, with windows that take up almost the whole wall.
The older cathedral burned in 1218, and in 1220 work began on a new one. The master builder was at first Robert de Luzarches and after him Thomas de Cormont and his son Renaud. Their names appear in the octagonal labyrinth in the nave floor. Work began with the nave, which was unusual, perhaps because the old church still stood where the choir was to go. The main part of the church was finished around 1270. Building went quickly because the stone blocks were cut to standardised sizes, which was new. The cathedral had become the keeper of a relic said to be the head of John the Baptist, and it drew pilgrims.
The cathedral has a cruciform plan with three aisles, a broad transept and a ring of chapels around the choir. The nave is about 42 metres high to the vault and is carried by clustered piers that run unbroken from the floor to the vault ribs. The three-storey wall consists of the arcade, a triforium and tall windows; in the choir the triforium is also glazed, so that light takes over the wall. Outside, the vaults are carried by flying buttresses. The west front has three deep portals with a rich sculptural programme, with Christ standing on a pier at the central portal. The sculptures were originally painted, as laser scanning has shown.
The cathedral came through the Wars of Religion, the Revolution and both world wars relatively well. During the First World War it was protected with sandbags and several of the stained-glass windows were removed. Eugène Viollet-le-Duc restored it in the 19th century. The cathedral became a World Heritage Site in 1981. It has been a model for many later Gothic churches, including Cologne Cathedral, and is often used in teaching as an example of how the High Gothic system of piers, vaults and flying buttresses works.