Saint-Amé Church

Saint-Édouard Church, known locally as the Church of the 12th, was built from 1899 to 1901 in the new mining town on the outskirts of Shaft No. 12 of the Lens mines, which began operating in 1894. The church is dedicated to Saint Edward, patron saint of Edouard Bollaert, director of the Lens mining company for forty-two years.

The present church is a reconstruction of the former church destroyed in 1918. The only remnant of the pre-1918 church is the statue of the Virgin Mary found in the rubble of the post-World War I ruins. On 9 June 1923, the reconstruction project was accepted and signed by the mayor of Lens. Looking very much like the previous one, its location was moved back several metres as part of the widening of the Place Jean Jaurès. Faced with the risks generated by the mine galleries passing under the city, the structure is no longer made of stone but of reinforced concrete and the walls are thus less thick. The pulpit was inaugurated in 1928 and the large organs were completed in April 1930.

Église catholique Saint-Laurent à Neuville-Saint-Vaast was built in the neo-gothic style by the architects J.de Saint Maurice and H. Philippe. They chose re-enforced concrete using the techniques of a local man, François Hennebique.