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St Ferréol Church + Old Port Marseille

A Reverse Chronology

St Ferreol Church Marseille © Lavender's Blue Stuart Blakley

Marseille is over in a flash: fleeting days in the sun, days a mere handbreadth, mere phantoms in the sun. To paraphrase Sir Sherard Cowper-Coles, we’ve zigged our way through the zaggers. Our last place of discovery is an historic building in Vieux Port. We’re taking a moment to rewind the years and decades and centuries.

St Ferreol Church Marseille Facade © Lavender's Blue Stuart Blakley

St Ferreol Church Marseille Chapel © Lavender's Blue Stuart Blakley

St Ferreol Church Marseille Altar © Lavender's Blue Stuart Blakley

St Ferreol Church Marseille Bust © Lavender's Blue Stuart Blakley

  • 2019: Lavender’s Blue descend on St Ferréol Church.
  • 1979: A statue of the Holy Family by Yves Le Pape is added to the third chapel on the right.
  • 1875: The façade is rebuilt, incorporating a statue of the Immaculate Conception, as part of the construction of the Rue de la République.
  • 1844: Augustin Zeiger builds and installs the gothic style organ.
  • 1801: The façade and first bay of the church are demolished to make way for road widening.
  • 1800s: The Jesuits take over the running of the church.
  • 1700s: The multicoloured marble altar is installed.
  • 1700s: The bell tower is erected.
  • 1600: A bust of the Patron Saint is placed in the third chapel on the left.
  • 1588: The vault is completed.
  • 1564: The tomb of the Mazenod family is established in the third chapel on the left.
  • 1542: The Augustinian church is dedicated on 15 January.
  • 1379: The building is transferred to Augustinian monks.
  • 1100s: Knights Templar erect a building on the current site.
  • 200s: St Ferréol is martyred for refusing to offer a sacrifice to idols

St Ferreol Church Marseille Plaque © Lavender's Blue Stuart Blakley

 

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La Tourette Marseille + Fernand Pouillon

The Divine Architect

“I am content to place humankind at the centre of Creation. We are complex enough, interesting enough… I find the soul a valuable concept, a statement of the dignity of a human life and of the unutterable gravity of human action and experience.” So says Christian philosopher Marilynne Robinson. Fernand Pouillon was the architect of this influential Postwar housing scheme overlooking Fort St Jean at the tip of Marseille’s Vieux Port. Completed in 1953, it quickly became something of a prototype. How to do modernism. A lesson in proportion. Rising to 21 storeys, precast concrete decks with cross walls in shuttered concrete and external walls faced with stone casing produced a lasting effect. La Tourette continues to offer sleek slices of desirable urban living.