Notre-Dame Cathedral is set to reopen to the public this December five and half years after it was badly damaged by fire. The iconic building has been restored using a combination of digital technologies and medieval engineering practices.

At around 6.20pm on 15 April 2019, a fire broke out inside Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris. The fire burned until the next morning, destroying the roof, spire and a network of supporting oak beams so vast it was known as la forêt (the forest). The burning remains (including some 30,000 scaffolding poles, in place because restoration work was already being done on the spire) crashed through Notre-Dame’s limestone vaulting into the main cathedral, causing even more damage.

Over 850 years after it was built, one of Europe’s most visited landmarks lay in ruins. For a while it looked as if the site of Napoleon’s coronation and Charles de Gaulle’s memorial service – and the building whose bells had signalled the end of Nazi occupation – would collapse completely...