Église Saint-Laurent

Église Saint-Laurent stands in Paris’s tenth arrondissement as a Catholic church whose origins reach back to the tenth century. The present building preserves fifteenth-century elements, while repeated rebuilding shaped its appearance across later centuries. Its nineteenth-century Flamboyant Gothic façade reflects the urban redesign carried out under Napoleon III and Baron Haussmann.

Inside, two equal-height levels and large windows create a simpler Gothic space filled with daylight. The fifteenth-century choir gained elaborate coats of arms and Corinthian capitals through Antoine Lepautre’s seventeenth-century alterations. Stained-glass windows trace French religious glassmaking from the nineteenth to the twentieth century, showing saints and biblical scenes. Woodwork, paintings, sculptures, and the organ extend this artistic story throughout the church.

The grand organ retains an ornate wooden case dating from the late seventeenth century. A sculpture of Christ by Aimé-Napoléon Perrey gives the façade one especially recognisable detail. Like the stained glass, the organ shows how successive periods added new work without erasing the church’s older structure.