“Notre-Dame du Raincy and the Great War.” Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians 78, no. 4 (December 2019): 454-71.
Society of Architectural Historians Founders’ Award, 2021
>>> Download PDF
French architects and artists tasked with commemorating World War I faced several vexing questions. How should they immortalize the staggering number of deaths and the destruction that swallowed vast areas of France? Despite this carnage, could their nation extract some advantages from the war? And had the Great War transformed France into a modern industrialized state, or had it thrust France back into the grip of its pre-industrial traditions? Disguised as nothing more than a modest suburban church, Auguste and Gustave Perret’s Notre-Dame du Raincy wrangles with these big, difficult questions.