These days everyone knows about the landmark buildings that Auguste Perret gave to Le Havre, but not so much is known about the apartment interiors the architect proposed for the citizens of the city who lost their homes in the war. Appartement Témoin Perret Source: Okapi07 / Wikimedia | CC BY-SA 3.0 Appartement Témoin Perret Maison de l’Armateur (House of the Ship-owner) has five storeys around an atrium lit from the roof by an octagonal skylight.Īll of the furniture and art dates to the 1700s and 1800s, and the rooms give you insights about the people who lived here, like the cabinets of curiosities, the plush library and study of a rich merchant. The townhouse, planned by Paul-Michel Thibault, who also plotted the city’s fortifications, was untouched by the devastation in 1944 and has been preserved as an historic monument since 1950. Flickr | CC BY-SA Maison de l’ArmateurĪn edifying snapshot of life in Le Havre at the beginning of the 19th century is on quai de l’île in the Quartier Saint-François. There’s much more going on here than meets your first glance, as the church is informed by abstraction and the reforms of the Second Vatican Council.Įverything you see has meaning but you may need some hints to decode it.ĥ. Such is the church’s presence that you can see it from almost anywhere in Le Havre and it stands as a beacon for sea traffic at night. So when you stand in the choir there’s nothing above you but a hollow tube with bare concrete illuminated by sunlight filtered through stained glass. With a neo-gothic temple he showed what reinforced concrete could achieve by devising a self-supporting tower 107 metres tall. Joseph’s ChurchĪuguste Perret’s incredible church is modern architecture at its most powerful.

Joseph’s Church Source: Oliverouge 3 / shutterstock St. Lets explore the best things to do in Le Havre: 1. The port is the busiest in France and will excite those interested by trade and commerce from the 16th to the 21st century. His efforts have now been rewarded with UNESCO status, and you don’t have to be into modern architecture to love the clean lines and boldness of the city’s public spaces and monuments. Le Havre looked to the future and hired the modernist Auguste Perret, a mentor of Le Corbusier, to rebuild the centre following the destruction of the Second World War.

Grzegorz Urbanek (Poland), Dennis de Zwart (Norway/Westwall/Ostwall), Walter (St Nazaire) and Henk Adriaanse (Europe).If you want to get the most out of Le Havre you have to come ready to experience somewhere that differs from a normal, picturesque French city. Peter Heijkoop (Denmark/France), Martin Lang (Westwall), Tom Oliviers (Belgium), Erik Ritterbach (Norway/Westwall), Daniel Schellenberger (Westwall), Tønnes Schrøder (Denmark), Torsten (Fanø), Thanks for additional fieldwork by Ron Bakker (IJmuiden), Roy de Bruijn (Northern France), Martin Büren (Poland), Erik Ettrup (Norway), Luckily some places were too remote to make salvage profitable, and sometimes the bunkers were still in use by the different European armies.īecause of that we can still see some examples of these parts which are among the most impressive of German military architecture.

The steel was rare and the bunkers didn't have any purpose anymore. After the war, many armoured parts where removed for scrap.

Le havre u boot bunker