★★★★★ 5.0
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Eglise de la Sainte Trinité
Workers are still fine-tuning that massive Cavaillé-Coll organ towering above you – the same 82-rank instrument that made Alexandre Guilmant famous when he played here for thirty years starting in 1871. You're standing in front of one of Paris's most ingenious churches, built between 1861 and 1867 with a secret that most visitors never notice: this entire 90-meter-long structure is held up by an iron skeleton, making it one of the first metal-frame churches in France. Before this Second Empire masterpiece rose on Place d'Estienne d'Orves, two smaller churches failed here – one from 1850 got too cramped, and another from 1852 now sits under the Casino de Paris down the street. Napoleon III personally approved Théodore Ballu's audacious design featuring that 63-meter tower – one of Paris's tallest – crowned with the four evangelists and their animal symbols. Step inside and you'll discover why Ballu chose plain WHITE stained glass throughout the nave instead of colors – it floods this soaring space with brilliant natural light, creating what locals call the most theatrical church interior in the 9th arrondissement.
Did You Know?
- The Église de la Sainte-Trinité served as a makeshift hospital during the Franco-Prussian War (1870–71): When Paris was besieged and many buildings were without heat, the church’s large nave and working furnace made it a vital refuge for the wounded; parishioners even set up a kitchen and laundry in the crypt, and temporary chimneys installed for heating left lasting smoke stains on the ceiling.
- Designed by Théodore Ballu in the ornate Second Empire (Neo-Renaissance) style, the church’s imposing 65-meter belfry and dramatic facade—inspired by grand train stations of the era—feature three statues representing the Holy Trinity and four more symbolizing the cardinal virtues, while the interior dazzles with a long nave, floral and arabesque ceiling paintings, and a bold mural of the Trinity holding hands, which was considered audacious for its time.
- The church is a landmark in French musical history: It hosted the funerals of composers Gioachino Rossini (1868), Hector Berlioz (1869), and Georges Bizet (1875), and later became the workplace of Olivier Messiaen, one of the 20th century’s most influential composers, who was the church’s organist for an astonishing 61 years until his death in 1992.