Restoring the Quasi-Mystic Acoustics at Notre-Dame

Plus, American "gruyère" gets wings, & Picasso Museum tackles artist's dark side

Dear Subscribers,

I couldn’t quite decide on one overarching thing-to-muse-on for today’s issue, so I decided to present you with a little digest of interesting France-related news I’ve been reading this week.

First, the New York Times has a remarkable new multimedia feature out that explores the efforts of a Paris-based research team to restore Notre-Dame Cathedral’s acoustics, after the terrible 2019 fire there dampened them significantly.

In the wake of the fire, which led to the destruction of the Cathedral’s 19th-century flamboyant spire and left several holes in the nave, the research team took detailed measurements at Notre-Dame to gain a precise understanding of its acoustic capacity.