Our Lady of the Holy Cross of Menilmontant

For a long time, Ménilmontant, then a hamlet, remained under the supervision of the priest of the Saint-Jean-Baptiste de Belleville church. At the beginning of the 19th century, its population greatly increased, and in 1823 (some documents indicate 1833), the priest of Belleville, Abbot Longbois, had a chapel built: Notre-Dame-de-la-Croix. Its first priest was Abbot Depille (appointed on March 18, 1847). In 1858, the chapel became a parish in its own right.

Around the middle of the 19th century, this chapel no longer met the needs of the parish as it could only hold four hundred people. It was destroyed and then replaced by the current church. The construction, which began in 1863, was not completed until 1880, but it became a place of worship as early as 1869. Shortly thereafter, militants of the Paris Commune used it to hold political meetings, and it was there that the death of the Archbishop of Paris, Monsignor Darboy, was voted by acclamation on May 6, 1871.

The name of the church is believed to come from a statue of the Holy Virgin originally located in an establishment in Ménilmontant, owned by the Brothers of the Holy Cross, regular canons settled in Paris on rue Sainte-Croix-de-la-Bretonnerie (a building destroyed during the revolution of 1789).

The architecture of this church is inspired by Romanesque and Gothic models, arranged around a very elongated plan and a relatively narrow central nave.

The current church was designed during the reign of Napoleon III, by the architect Louis-Jean-Antoine Héret (1821-1899) in a Neo-Romanesque style. It is built on the steep slope of the Ménilmontant hill, which necessitated the construction of a flight of 54 steps to compensate for the difference in level between the square where the facade is located and the apse.

The Notre-Dame-de-la-Croix Church is an imposing building: 97 meters long, 38 meters wide, and 20 meters high under the vault of the nave. It covers an area of 3,195 square meters and its bell tower reaches a height of 78 meters.

In terms of length, it is the third-largest church in Paris and has a very large area of slate roofs. Some of the lower copper coverings are original. They are supported by wooden frameworks, but the attic of the church also has metal beams complementing the cast iron ribs visible under the vaults of the nave. Héret thus built a traditionally designed building but managed to add a modern and bold metal structure for the time, to support the vaults.

The church has the unique feature of a metal structure that is particularly visible under the vaults of the nave.

The oldest painting depicts the Martyrdom of Saint Crispin (1620) by Alexandre Durant. It is the only known work by this painter.

Dating from the 19th century and mostly from the inauguration of the church, the other works are by the following artists:

• Jean-Jacques Lagrenée (The Death of Joseph, left transept, east side)
• Pierre Claude François Delorme (Jesus Descending to Limbo, left transept, west side)
• Albert Chanot (a mixed composition including a statue of The Virgin at the foot of Christ on the Cross and a large painting illustrating The Story of Suffering and Saved Humanity, right transept, east side)
• Jean-Pierre Granger (Jesus Healing the Sick, right transept, west side)
• Jean-Baptiste Charpentier (Saint Paul on the Road to Damascus, 1819, left side of the ambulatory)
• Constant-Louis-Félix Smith (Moses and the Bronze Serpent, 1819, left side of the ambulatory; painting designed for the Church of Saint-Paul-Saint-Louis)
• Jules Loebnitz and Léon Chédeville (earthenware depicting Two Angels Adoring the Sacred Heart, 1881, right side of the ambulatory)
• Jules Louis Machard (four scenes from the life of the Virgin Mary, apsidal chapel)
• Xavier-Alphonse Monchablon

In 1874, a remarkable organ was constructed, a creation that involved the skilled hands and ingenious mind of the famous organ builder Aristide Cavaillé-Coll. This exceptional instrument featured three manual keyboards and a pedalboard, encompassing a total of 26 stops. During its design, Cavaillé-Coll encountered two significant challenges: the first was to accommodate the monumental rose window, and the second, to navigate the passage of bells at the center of the gallery. Ingeniously, he devised a solution by crafting the organ's case in two distinct parts, a design that ingeniously allowed for a clear view of the rose window. Renowned for its sound quality, this organ stands as a testament to Cavaillé-Coll's craftsmanship. It has not only won acclaim from organists for its exceptional quality but also has earned the distinguished status of being classified as a historical monument.