It’s evening. People want to gather to celebrate mass. Small detail: electricity hasn’t yet been invented. What to do? In Saint-Antoine-de-Padoue, in the years before Thomas Edison’s invention, candles were obviously used. Lots and lots of candles. Up to 320 during midnight mass.
These candles were placed on the huge retractable cut-glass chandelier suspended from the center of the dome, in those days much closer to the ground. And… what was done to prevent these candles from turning the magnificent cocathedral floor into a wax statue? We covered it with newspapers. A brilliant solution that would later inspire many a budgie owner…