La Madeleine, Aix’s largest church, closed in 2007 for much-needed renovations. When I visited prior to this, it was gloomy, criss-crossed with cracks, and smelled fusty. The work was due to be finished by 2014, but is still closed. I had wondered when walking past what was holding things up. It seems not much, literally.
It’s been discovered that the church has no foundations, at all. There are simply four pillars supporting the building. So workers have had to dig down several metres and underpin the structure with chalk, sand and resin. The cracks are thought to have come, not so much from the 1909 earthquake which had been suspected, but temperature changes and of course the row of little shops that had nibbled into the southern wall to increase their size.
Paintings are being cleaned and a dramatic trompe l’oeil fresco has been discovered behind the altar – it reproduces the pillars of the nave, making the church look longer.
But we will have to wait another 3-4 years to step inside this historic building and see, once again, the font where Paul Cézanne was christened.
aixcentric 
Oh my goodness! After all teh work that they have already done, it’s unbelievable that it took them this long to find out about the (lack of) foundations.
Think that’s what has been taking all the time. Who would have thought it??