The flying buttresses on this late 15th Century Parisian church near the Gare de l’Est had suffered from chronic structural issues, and as an emergency security measure had been encased in reinforced concrete some time in the mid 20th Century. Finally public funding had been found to replace them with new stone. However, all trace of any decorative motifs had been lost, except for an old postcard of the church from about 1900.

The photograph (right) was clear enough to see that there was some kind of carved element within a small arrangement of gable tracery, but it was not possible to see what the images depicted were. The architect from Monuments Historiques took the brave decision to show in each new gable a representation of the six restoration trades working on the project: a glazier, a roofer, a carpenter, a fixer mason, a banker mason, and a carver. I carved all six buttresses for Quélin S.A., including all tracery.