March 11 marks the 600th birthday of Bern’s Minster. Usually covered in scaffolding, this year the tallest cathedral in Switzerland can be admired in its entirety. Here’s a sneak peek at how its restoration processes have evolved using the newest techniques.
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2 minutes
Céline joined swissinfo.ch in 2018 as video journalist for the 'Nouvo in English' project, just after graduating from the Academie du journalisme et des medias (AJM) at the University of Neuchâtel. Originally from Ticino, she's been filming, writing and interviewing people all over Switzerland since she got her first reporter badge at 11 during a school camp.
If you’ve visited the Swiss capital, chances are your pictures show the ongoing restoration process that seems to perpetually trap the town’s minster. And rightly so: to reach the age of 600 and older, maintenance is key. A team of stonemasons and restorersExternal link is constantly at work to repair and protect the different architectural elements.
The late gothic church before 1893.
Gabriel Ludwig Lory – helveticarchives.ch
View on the cathedral from the Casinoplatz, 1939.
Rdb By Dukas / Klameth
Building protection measures as a precaution against possible bombing during World War II, 1940.
Rdb By Dukas / Klameth
A stonemason works on a sandstone block in the ‘Münsterbauhütte’ – the cathedral’s craft atelier, 1941.
Rdb By Dukas / Klameth
A view of Bern’s old town with the cathedral in the background, 1939.
Rdb By Dukas / Klameth
The 234 finely crafted worldwide famous sandstone figures on the cathedral portal represent the Last Judgment.
Keystone / Tschanz-hofmann
Young citizens of Bern stand under the main portal of the cathedral in front of the lectern on the occasion of the national celebration of 1952.
RDB / ATP / Lörtscher
The choir stalls were made between 1522 and 1525 by Jacob Ruess and Heini Seewagen. The carvings depict biblical scenes and people from everyday life.
Mike Lehmann
From 1421, generations of builders worked according to the rules and architectural style of the late Gothic on this masterpiece, which was only completed in 1893. The last long-standing renovation of the Minster Tower was completed in 2017.
Berthold Steinhilber/laif
The Minster’s tower from above.
Keystone / Gaetan Bally
Cleaning the tympanum above the main entrance. Because of birds building nets, the poor souls need a scrub every six years.
Tomas Wüthrich / 13 Photo
Climbing on the minster: The flag of the Vietnamese Liberation Front (FNL), attached to the top by young people at night, is taken down by the police. (Sergius Golowin)
Staatsarchiv des Kantons Bern, Fotonachlass Margrit Baumann
The late Gothic windows date from between 1441 and 1455 and are 12 metres high. The two to the right of the central window date from 1868 and show scenes from the New Testament.
Andreas Praefcke
Buddhist monks say a prayer for the victims of the seaquake in Southeast Asia. Wednesday, January 5, 2005, at the funeral service in the Münster in Bern on the occasion of the National Day of Mourning.
Keystone / Yoshiko Kusano
View of Bern’s Old Town at the blue hour during cherry blossom season, with Nydegg Church on the left, Minster in the middle, and the Parliament building on the right.
Keystone / Martin Kober
The fire brigade rescues the tower warden from his apartment in the cathedral. During the main exercise of Bern’s fire brigade, the population is allowed to watch up close.
Keystone / Lukas Lehmann
View on the cathedral’s tower.
Keystone / Peter Klaunzer
Dutch and French football fans visit Bern’s minster during the European Championship of 2008.
Keystone / Alessandro Della Bella
A wonderful evening over the roofs of Bern.
Reuters / Stefan Wermuth
Annette Loeffel, one of the minster’s architects leading the construction work, recalls how as a young intern, she was told it took 80 years to go once all around the cathedral restoring its pieces. Things have changed since: the architect’s been using laser technology to clean the stone faster. However caution is always required, as too much energy could damage the delicate stone.
“Lasers are sometimes used to get rid of the rust on cargo ships,” Loeffel explained to Swiss public television, SRFExternal link. “Of course, that wouldn’t have been quite the right thing for these fine surfaces. So we worked our way around it until we found a setting and a device that could deliver good results here.” The cathedral architect was inspired by her colleagues at Cologne Cathedral in Germany.
Bern’s cathedral, a Cultural Property of National Significance, is mostly made of local sage-green sandstone. The foundation stone of today’s Bern Minster was laid on March 11, 1421, and the construction work lasted until 1575. Initially just 50 metres high, the cathedral’s tower only reached the record height of 101 metres 300 years later. It is still the tallest cathedral in Switzerland. Because of the pandemic, the official four-day-long celebrationExternal link has been postponed to 2022.
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