The Saint-Leu-Saint-Gilles church is located at 92 rue Saint-Denis, in the 1st arrondissement of the capital.
It is one of the last religious edifices that were numerous in the past to mark the route taken by the royal corteges entering Paris after the coronation of the sovereigns or the return of their funeral in the basilica of Saint-Denis.
Classified as a Historical Monument since 1915, the church was built from 1235 and has been rebuilt several times, especially in 1857 when the boulevard de Sébastopol was built. The works at the church, led in particular by the architect Victor Baltard, led then to the destruction of three chapels of the apse.
Since 1819, the building houses the relics of St. Helena, which are venerated in the crypt of the Knights of the Order of the Holy Sepulcher.
Architecturally, the Saint-Leu-Saint-Gilles church is of Gothic style, with a facade adorned with two turrets. Without a transept, the nave is flanked by two collaterals.
Organs dating back to 1788, restored in 1983, numerous stained glass and two major works of art: a marble sculpture of St. Anne and the Virgin of John Bullant (sixteenth century) and a statue of the Angel of Meditation of Jean-Louis-Désiré Schroeder (nineteenth).
The Saint-Leu-Saint-Gilles church was long regarded as serving the smallest and poorest parish of Paris. Mistreated during the Revolution and then under the Commune, it is now served by religious of the order of the Trinitarians.
Since the 1970s, this church is intended to witness a Christian presence in the heart of a busy district, having undergone a strong evolution, where the Center Pompidou and the Forum des Halles are located.
Open every day. Information on +33 1 42 33 50 22.
