Lessons from the ruinlandet Germany when the Notre-Dame cathedral to be built up

the Heat was unbearable, they have survived eldstormen testified. Temperatures of up to 1.200 degrees got the city to boil. It was the night between the 13 and 14 February 1945 The allies dropped their bombs over Dresden in the Second world war's final phase.

Around 25,000 civilians died in the attack, and one of the most important in Europe barockstäder was in ruins.

Dresden's main monuments, the mighty church, the church of our lady (Frauenkirche) was completely destroyed. First burned inside: loose furnishings and dry wooden beams went up in smoke. Then followed the dome together and had the walls of the case.

A mutilated tower surrounded by a heap of rubble was all that was left of the baroque church from the 1700s first half of the year.

church of our lady in Dresden was destroyed in 1945 and was still in ruins in 1967, when the picture is taken. Photo: AP

the ruins as a memorial of the horrors of war. Stones from the demolished church were used to patch sidewalks in other parts of the broken city.

But the dream of re-light a candle and sing a hymn in the burnt down church lived on fire Dresden's inhabitants. There was a lack of money and political will (the religion was seen as the opium of the east German regime) to build up the house of God again. The church ruins remained an open wound in the decades that passed.

Only after the fall of the berlin wall was raised the idea of allowing the church to re-emerge from the ruins again. A campaign was started to collect private donations for the costly and complicated construction. The interest was beyond our expectations and already in 1994 was the first sod. After more than ten years of construction work was the time to inaugurate the massive church building at the new, 60 years after the rich at the ground.

church of our lady in 1989. Photo: Brian Harris/TT

If bombnatten 1945 marked a before and an after, was Vårfrukyrkans the resurrection as a new – positive – a milestone in the hard-pressed city.

you don't Know that the church is not older than 15 years, it is easy to be fooled into thinking that the building has stood there for centuries (but someone has polished the facade carefully). Solid black stones and the bright kalkstensfasaden reveals a darker past. During the build process was looking experts out originalstenar who survived the war, and allowed the geologists to find out the exact location in the building where they once sat.

the Bill for the reconstruction landed on the equivalent of sek 1.4 billion in the money value assigned to it, which for the most part funded by donations.

from the huge devastation which hit european cities during the Second world war are difficult to digest. In addition to the enormous human suffering resulted in the ravages of that praktbyggnader turned to gravel, churches burned down and the statues maimed.

Image 1 of 2 church of our lady, August 11, 2016. Photo: Arno Burgi/TT Slide 2 of 2 The first visitors in the reconstructed church of our lady in Dresden, October 2005. Photo: Jens Meyer/AP photo Slideshow

Some cities, such as Warsaw and Gdansk, had built up the war and nerbrädna town centres, according to the old drawings. But in Germany gave the architects the previous stilidealen slammed. Both in the east and in the west was considered to classicism, national romanticism, and the prussian style symbolize oppression and misery. Instead, hailed the modernist idiom. Straight lines, simple facades, and an absence of ornamentation would help to nurture a democratic man, was considered.

but now, 70 years after the war, many harking back to the days of former splendor. Recent years have also a number of the churches, the castle and the entire town centers have been built up according to the original drawings. Around in Germany boasts the now newly built replicas of old monuments.

In Berlin are being built right now a copy of the city's old kejsarslott up. Golden kungakronor, pillars and a magnificent dome gracing now a full city block in the heart of east Berlin, at the same place where east germany's parliament.

Potsdamer Strasse in Berlin in 1945. Photo: AP

Potsdam is where the old town is built up on the new. Set up, the baroque Barberini and there are many ideas are some examples of buildings that for decades had been erased from the map, but which have now resurfaced.

In Dresden, has in addition to the church of our lady also, the old square, the Neumarkt built up again, and in Frankfurt-am-Main has parts of old town have been restored.

It has given jobs to a whole industry of kulturvårdare, finsnickrare and byggnadshistoriker. And preceded by a very German debate on the appropriateness of looking backwards instead of forwards.

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