Images of St. Maclou, Rouen, France. Digital Imaging Project: Art historical images of European and North American architecture and sculpture from classical Greek to Post-modern. Scanned from slides taken on site by Mary Ann Sullivan, Bluffton College.

St. Maclou--page 1

begun 1434; major additions, c. 1500-1514; consecrated 1521

The bowed front
Although work was begun on this smallish (75 x 180 feet long) parish church in 1434, the curved entrance porch was not added until the first decades of the sixteenth century. In Rouen, the capital of Normandy, this late Gothic church has some parallels with the "Decorated style" in England. (Normandy was especially susceptible to English influence during the Hundred Years' War.) The richness of decoration, the perforated gables, and the use of curvilinear and pointed tracery (like flickering flames) are characteristic features of the French "Flamboyant style."

The entrance and a topmost gable
The entrance porch appears to have five portals; however, the outermost portals are "blind." The portals are capped by steep gables which rise in height toward the center. The gables are connected by a balustrade. (See detail below.) Crockets (from the French word croquet=hook) project at regular intervals along the edges of the gables and buttresses.

View of the "blind" portal on the entrance porch and the nave; detail of a nave window

Detail of the gables and connecting balustrade; details of the central gable

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Copyright © Mary Ann Sullivan. I have photographed (on site), scanned, and manipulated all the images on these pages. Please feel free to use them for personal or educational purposes. (I would appreciate being told if you find them useful.) They are not available for commercial purposes without my explicit permission.

Page maintained by Mary Ann Sullivan, sullivanm@bluffton.edu

The bowed front Although work was begun on this smallish (75 x 180 feet long) parish church in 1434, the curved entrance porch was not added until the first decades of the sixteenth century. In Rouen, the capital of Normandy, this late Gothic church has some parallels with the "Decorated style" in England. (Normandy was especially susceptible to English influence during the Hundred Years' War.) The richness of decoration, the perforated gables, and the use of curvilinear and pointed tracery (like flickering flames) are characteristic features of the French "Flamboyant style."


The entrance and a topmost gable The entrance porch appears to have five portals; however, the outermost portals are "blind." The portals are capped by steep gables which rise in height toward the center. The gables are connected by a balustrade. (See detail below.) Crockets (from the French word croquet=hook) project at regular intervals along the edges of the gables and buttresses.


View of the "blind" portal on the entrance porch and the nave; detail of a nave window

Detail of the gables and connecting balustrade; details of the central gable