Eugène Viollet-le-Duc

Eugène Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc (Paris, January 27 1814 – September 17, 1879 in Lausanne) was a French architect and theorist, famous for his restorations of medieval buildings. He was as central a figure in the Gothic Revival in France as he was in the public discourse on "honesty" in architecture, which eventually transcended all revival styles, to inform the moving spirit of Modernism. Sir John summerson considered that "there have been two supremely eminent theorists in the history of European architecture—Leon Battista Alberti and Eugène Viollet-le-Duc" (Summerson 1948).

Further reading

• Summerson, Sir John, 1948. ""Viollet-le-Duc and the rational point of view" collected in Heavenly Mansions and Other essays on Architecture.