Victor Baltard (; 9 June 180513 January 1874) was a French architect famed for work in Paris including designing
Les Halles market and the
Saint-Augustin church.
Life
Victor was born in Paris, son of architect
Louis-Pierre Baltard and attended
Lycée Henri IV. During his student days Baltard, a
Lutheran
Lutheranism is a major branch of Protestantism that emerged under the work of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German friar and Protestant Reformers, reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practices of the Catholic Church launched ...
, attended the
Calvinist
Reformed Christianity, also called Calvinism, is a major branch of Protestantism that began during the 16th-century Protestant Reformation. In the modern day, it is largely represented by the Continental Reformed Protestantism, Continenta ...
Temple du Marais with other
Protestant
Protestantism is a branch of Christianity that emphasizes Justification (theology), justification of sinners Sola fide, through faith alone, the teaching that Salvation in Christianity, salvation comes by unmerited Grace in Christianity, divin ...
students including
Georges-Eugène Haussmann with whom he would collaborate in the latter's
renovation of Paris.
He later studied at the
École des Beaux-Arts
; ) refers to a number of influential art schools in France. The term is associated with the Beaux-Arts architecture, Beaux-Arts style in architecture and city planning that thrived in France and other countries during the late nineteenth centu ...
, where he garnered the
Prix de Rome for designing a military school in 1833. He went on to study at the
French Academy in Rome, Italy, from 1834 to 1838 under the direction of
Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres.

From 1849 on, he was
Architect of the City of Paris. In this office, he was responsible for the restoration of several churches, as well as the construction of the
Catholic
The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...
Saint-Augustin (1860–67), in which he united the structural values of stone and steel.
His most popular achievement was, however, the building of Les Halles, the central market in Paris, during the years 1853 to 1870.
In 1972 and 1973, however, these halls were torn down. A single hall (completed in 1854) was classified as a historical monument and moved to
Nogent-sur-Marne in 1971, where it is now known as the
Pavillon Baltard.
Victor Baltard also built the slaughterhouses and the cattle market of Les Halles de la Villette, as well as the tombs of composer
Louis James Alfred Lefébure-Wély at the
Père Lachaise Cemetery and of jurist
Léon Louis Rostand at
Montmartre Cemetery.
He was largely instrumental in introducing a regular scheme of
fresco decoration by modern artists in the churches of Paris, to take the place of the heterogeneous collections of pictures of all kinds with which their walls had been promiscuously decorated.
Works
;Architecture
*The tomb of the composer
Louis James Alfred Lefébure-Wély (1817–1869) at the
Père Lachaise Cemetery
*
Hôtel du Timbre (1846-1848)
*The 12 pavilions of Les Halles in Paris (1853–1870) (the Pavilion Baltard No. 8 was moved to
Nogent-sur-Marne in 1971)
*Cattle market of Les Halles de la Villette
*Construction of the
Church of St. Augustine (1860–1871)
*Facade of
Notre-Dame-des-Blancs-Manteaux: originally from the Church of St-Elois-des-Barnabites which was then located in the Ile de la Cité, but was destroyed during the work of Haussmann and reassembled by Baltard in 1863.
;Restorations
*Restoration of the church of
Saint-Germain l'Auxerrois, in collaboration with
Jean-Baptiste Lassus from 1838 to 1855.
*Restoration of the church of
Saint-Eustache, Paris in 1844.
*Restoration of the chapel of
Pentemont Abbey as a
Protestant
Protestantism is a branch of Christianity that emphasizes Justification (theology), justification of sinners Sola fide, through faith alone, the teaching that Salvation in Christianity, salvation comes by unmerited Grace in Christianity, divin ...
church in 1844.
*Restoration of the church of
Saint-Étienne-du-Mont: he directed the construction of the chapel of Catechisms and restored the facade of the church between 1861 and 1868.
*Restoration of the
church of Saint-Germain-des-Prés.
*Restoration of the church of
Saint-Séverin, Paris.
*Restoration of the church of
Saint-Paul-Saint-Louis: The architect is responsible primarily for the redevelopment of the choir and the refurbishment of the facade.
Gallery
File:Interior of église Saint-Augustin de Paris 22.JPG, Church of Saint-Augustine showing the cast iron shafts and iron-framed roof
File:Pavillon Baltard - Nogent-sur-Marne.jpg, The Pavillon Baltard in Nogent-sur-Marne, the last surviving hall from Baltard's Les Halles
File:Candélabre Panthéon.JPG, Candelabra of the Panthéon
File:Ingres - Mme Victor Baltard & sa fille Paule.jpg, Portrait of Victor Baltard's wife (born Adeline Lequeu) and their daughter Paule by Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres
References
Attribution:
*
External links
"Victor, membre de la famille"
{{DEFAULTSORT:Baltard, Victor
1805 births
1874 deaths
Architects from Paris
19th-century French architects
Prix de Rome for architecture
École des Beaux-Arts alumni
Members of the Académie des beaux-arts
French Lutherans
Officers of the Legion of Honour
19th-century Lutherans