Editing Eugène Viollet-le-Duc (section)

==Imperial projects: Carcassonne, Vincennes and Pierrefonds==
<gallery mode="packed" heights="200px">
File:Carcasonneouterwall.jpg|The walled town of [[Carcassonne]] (restored 1853–1879)
File:Donjon of Château de Vincennes, South-West View 140308 1.jpg|The keep of the [[Château de Vincennes]] (restored in the 1860s)
File:Description du chateau de pierrefonds Figure 00.png|Drawing by VLD of the [[Château de Pierrefonds]] before restoration
File:Замки, с. 6–7.jpg|Plans of Pierrefonds by Viollet-le-Duc
File:Château de Pierrefonds exterior Oise.jpg|The [[Château de Pierrefonds]] today
File:0 Chapiteau polychrome du château de Pierrefonds (1).JPG|Polychrome decoration at Pierrefonds by Viollet-le-Duc
</gallery>

The [[French coup d'état of 1851]] brought [[Napoleon III]] to power and transformed France from a republic to an empire.  The coup accelerated some of Viollet-le-Duc's projects as his patron Prosper Mérimée had introduced him to the new Emperor.  He moved forward with the slow work of restoration of the [[Cathedral of Reims]] and [[Cathedral of Amiens]].  In Amiens, he cleared the interior of the French classical decoration added under Louis XIV, and proposed to make it resolutely Gothic. He gave the Emperor a tour of his project in September 1853; the Empress immediately offered to pay two-thirds of the cost of the restoration.  In the same year he undertook the restoration of the [[Château de Vincennes]], long occupied by the military, along with its chapel, similar to [[Sainte-Chapelle]].  A devotee of the pure Gothic, he described the chapel as "one of the finest specimens of Gothic in decline".{{sfn|Poisson|2014|page=58}}

In November 1853, he provided the costs and plans for the medieval ramparts of [[Carcassonne]] which he had first begun planning in 1849.  The first fortifications had been built by the [[Visigoths]]; on top of these, in the Middle Ages [[Louis XI of France|Louis&nbsp;XI]] and then [[Philip the Bold]] had built a formidable series of towers, galleries, walls, gates and interlocking defences that resisted all sieges until 1355. The fortifications were largely intact, since the surroundings of the city were still a military defensive zone in the 19th century, but the towers were without tops and a large number of structures had been built up against the old walls. Once he obtained funding and made his plans, he began demolishing all structures which had been added to the ramparts over the centuries, and restored the gates, walls and towers to their original form, including the defence platforms, roofs on the towers and shelters for archers that would have been used during a siege. He found many of the original mountings for weapons still in place.  To accompany his work, he published a detailed history of the city and its fortifications, with his drawings.<ref>Eugène Viollet-le-Duc, ''La Cité de Carcassonne'', Librarie des Imprimeries Réunies, Paris 1888</ref> Carcassonne became the best example of medieval military architecture in France, and also an important tourist attraction.{{sfn|Poisson|2014|page=158}}

Napoleon&nbsp;III provided additional funding for the continued restoration of Notre-Dame. Viollet-le-Duc was also to replace the great bestiary of mythical beasts and animals which had decorated the cathedral in the 18th century. In 1856, using examples from other medieval churches and debris from Notre-Dame as his model, his workshop produced dragons, chimeras, grotesques, and gargoyles, as well as an assortment of picturesque pinnacles and [[fleuron (architecture)|fleurons]].{{sfn|Poisson|2014|pages=158–9}}  He engaged in a new project for restoration of the [[Cathedral of Clermont-Ferrand]], a project which continued for ten years.  He also undertook an unusual project for Napoleon&nbsp;III; the design and construction of six railway coaches with neo-Gothic interior décor for the Emperor and his entourage.  Two of the cars still exist; the salon of honour car, with a fresco on the ceiling, is at the [[Château de Compiègne]], and the dining car, with a massive golden eagle as the centrepiece of the décor, is at the Railroad Museum of [[Mulhouse]].

Napoleon&nbsp;III asked Viollet-le-Duc if he could restore a medieval chateau for the Emperor's own use near Compiègne, where the Emperor traditionally passed September and October.  Viollet-le-Duc first studied a restoration of the [[Château de Coucy]], which had the highest medieval tower in France.  When this proved too complicated, he settled upon [[Château de Pierrefonds]], a castle begun by Louis of Orleans in 1396, then dismantled in 1617 after several sieges by [[Louis XIII of France]].  Napoleon bought the ruin for 5000 francs in 1812, and Mérimée declared it an historic monument in 1848.  In 1857 Viollet-le-Duc began designing an entirely new chateau on the ruins.  This structure was not designed to recreate anything exactly that had existed, but a castle which recaptured the spirit of the Gothic, with lavish neo-Gothic decoration and 19th-century comforts.{{Sfn|Poisson|2014|page=190}} Pierrefonds and its inside decorations would not only influence William Burges and his Cardiff and Coch castles but also the castles of [[Ludwig II of Bavaria]] ([[Neuschwanstein Castle]]) and the [[Château du Haut-Koenigsbourg|Haut-Kœnigsbourg]] of the [[Wilhelm II, German Emperor|Emperor Wilhelm II]].

While most of his attention was devoted to restorations, Viollet-le-Duc designed and built a number of private residences and new buildings in Paris.  He also participated in the most important competition of the period, for the new [[Paris Opera]].  There were one hundred seventy-one projects proposed in the original competition, presented the [[Exposition Universelle (1855)|1855 Paris Universal Exposition]].  A jury of noted architects narrowed it down to five, including projects from Viollet-le-Duc and [[Charles Garnier (architect)|Charles Garnier]], age thirty-five. Viollet-le-Duc was finally eliminated and this put an end to Viollet le Duc's wish to construct public buildings. Napoleon&nbsp;III also called upon Viollet-le-Duc for a wide variety of archeological and architectural tasks. When he wished to put up a monument to mark the [[Battle of Alesia]], where Julius Caesar defeated the Gauls, a siege whose actual site was disputed by historians, he asked Viollet-le-Duc to locate the exact battlefield.  Viollet-le-Duc conducted excavations at various purported sites, and finally found vestiges of the walls built at the time. He also designed the metal frame for the six-metre-high statue of the Gallic chief [[Vercingetorix|Vercingétorix]] that would be placed on the site. He later designed a similar frame for a much larger statue, the [[Statue of Liberty]], but died before that statue was finished.{{Sfn|Poisson|2014|page=190}}