Émilien Mariette, winner of the 2024 Heritage Apprentice Pilgrim Prize

As royal as it is, the Palace of Versailles could not escape isolation standards. In his Orangery, the windows have just been changed. But it’s impossible to grasp the difference as the carpenters have painstakingly imitated the old ones. In operation, a workshop in Coutan-ces (Manche) where Émilien Mariette, an 18-year-old apprentice rewarded with the Pilgrim Prize for the Apprentice of Heritage in partnership with the GMH.

The young man is becoming accustomed to these prestigious projects. He has already worked on a wooden trellis for the Matignon garden or on a door for the Coutances cathedral. As a child, Émilien marveled at the framework of Mont-Saint-Michel, in Normandy where he grew up: “How did they achieve this feat without our modern machines? » he asked himself.

In this question his vocation germinated. Here he is passionate, not having the feeling of working as he has “carpentry in his skin”. That of authentic woodworking which perpetuates ancestral know-how and is expressed above all in the restoration of old buildings. “I don’t want to put up placo or insulation. I want to work with wood,” he insists. Because Émilien intends to be part of the long-term heritage and to build with his hands works which will be intended to be passed on.