Église Sainte-jeanne-d'arc
Photo essay by Fritz Brunier
After the 1944 bombings, the diocesan association built a church in Belford's working-class district of La Pépinière.
The architect chosen was Marcel Lods, who proposed a project for a parish centre combining a church, a sacristy, meeting and catechism rooms and accommodation for the priest and parish priests.
Between 1952 and 1957, only the church, sacristy and priests' accommodation were built. It is a rectangular reinforced concrete building flanked by an ornate bell tower. The stained glass windows are the work of Jean-Luc Perrot.
The church has been a listed building since 1999.
Marcel Lods worked as a freelance architect in Paris. Between 1928 and 1940, in collaboration with Eugène Beaudouin and Eugène Freyssinet, he produced numerous designs that tested new industrial materials and methods in the building industry of the time. In particular, he developed the use of prefabricated elements in building construction. As the French representative of the New Building movement, he sometimes worked with the engineer and designer Jean Prouvé. Lods experimented early on with steel frame and reinforced concrete constructions.
From 1940 to 1944, he was a member of the "Association pour une Rénovation Architecturale" (ASCORAL) with Le Corbusier. After the war, he worked for the military administration of the French occupation zone on a plan for the reconstruction of the city of Mainz.
