Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Chartres

Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Chartres, located in Chartres in the Eure-et-Loir department, is widely regarded as the most complete survival of a French High Gothic cathedral, retaining a structural and aesthetic coherence rarely achieved among buildings of its era. The current cathedral was built rapidly after a fire in 1194 destroyed most of the earlier Romanesque structure, and the main body was consecrated in 1220—a remarkably short construction period that accounts for the architectural unity of the nave, choir, and transepts. Two contrasting towers dominate the west façade: the Romanesque south tower (completed c. 1165) and the Flamboyant Gothic north tower (completed 1513), built in an entirely different style nearly 350 years later. Chartres possesses 176 stained-glass windows totalling approximately 2,600 square metres—the largest and most complete medieval glazing programme surviving in the world. Three 12th-century windows on the west façade, including the celebrated Notre-Dame de la Belle Verrière (Our Lady of the Beautiful Window), predate the 1194 fire and survived it intact. The 13th-century rose windows in the north and south transepts, donated respectively by the French royal family and the Counts of Dreux, are among the largest and finest examples of medieval glass in Europe. The north rose depicts the glorification of the Virgin; the south rose represents the Apocalypse. The cathedral is also an important pilgrimage site: the Sancta Camisa—a cloth venerated since the 9th century as the robe of the Virgin Mary at the Annunciation—is housed in the treasury. UNESCO inscribed Chartres Cathedral as a World Heritage Site in 1979. An ongoing interior restoration programme begun in 2009 has lightened the interior walls, restoring the medieval painted surface beneath centuries of darkened stonework.