Église protestante de Neudorf

Église protestante de Neudorf rises in France with a tall concrete campanile standing apart from the nave. Its pillars frame a peaceful courtyard that recalls an ancient patio. Robert Will rebuilt the church between 1959 and 1962, after bombing destroyed the earlier nineteenth-century neo-Romanesque building during World War Two. Concrete columns and openwork walls carry daylight deep into the interior.

Eleven stained-glass windows bring colour from the southern side and the choir into the nave. Robert Fausser and Vladimir Bischoff created them in 1961, with two abstract designs and nine scenes from the New Testament. Their changing light gives the interior a different atmosphere through the day. Alfred Kern completed the organ in 1966 with musical input from Albert Schweitzer.

A medallion and plaque beside the organ preserve Schweitzer’s connection with the instrument. Two bells from the earlier church survived the destruction and still sound alongside a later bell. The campanile, coloured glass, organ and salvaged bells hold the building’s story in visible and audible form.