Walking tour 4K-to Sacre'-Coeur Basillica Montmartre - Paris France September 2024

The building's impressive effect, especially from a distance, is due to its unique location on the Montmartre hill, the brilliant white of the materials used, its monumentality and the strange effect of the steep domes with their slender, non-illuminating lanterns . In contrast to the east orientation otherwise common in church architecture, Sacré-Cœur is oriented to the north. The arrangement of the components combines a central building covered by five domes and cross-shaped in plan based on the Byzantine model with a Romanesque ambulatory choir surrounded by a ring of chapels . Therefore, the term "basilica" does not refer to the type of building ; rather, the term basilica minor indicates a particularly high ecclesiastical rank.

The main façade, which faces the large staircase, is preceded by a portico-like vestibule that opens like a three-part triumphal arch . On the sides of the vestibule are equestrian statues of St. Louis and Joan of Arc . The five-meter-high equestrian statues of the patron saints of France were created by Hippolyte Lefèbvre in 1927 from bronze. Above this, a central niche is visible for a statue of Christ with a flaming heart surrounded by a crown of thorns . Above the choir's axial chapel rises a tower completed in 1912, which is a replica of that of the 12th-century Périgueux Cathedral . In the apse of the church there is a mosaic of the Sacred Heart by Luc-Olivier Merson (completed in 1922), which is one of the largest mosaics in the world at around 475 m² . It again shows Christ with a flaming heart wreathed in thorns and his arms outstretched. Since 1885 (a time when the church was only partially completed) there has been a monstrance containing the Blessed Sacrament above the high altar .