Four “cultural guerillas” were charged, and cleared, last week of breaking into Paris’ eighteenth-century Panthéon when it emerged that they had been secretly restoring the building’s antique clock. The restorers were members of a gang of “urban explorers” called Untergunther, which undertakes clandestine restoration of urban heritage. They have previously restored medieval church crypts and organised secret nighttime plays in cultural monuments.

The Panthéon clock, a Wagner clock dating from 1850, had been disused since the 1960s. The Untergunther team – which included a professional clockmaker – broke into the building and set up a secret workshop underneath the Panthéon’s dome. According to one of them, “Opening a lock is the easiest thing for a clockmaker.” For a year, they worked to clean and repair the clock, unnoticed by the building’s staff and security guards. They even managed to connect their “workshop” to the mains electricity grid and set up a computer with a connection to the internet. Once their task had been completed, they revealed the results of their labours to the Panthéon’s administrator so the clock could be wound and started once more. However, Monum (the French Centre of National Monuments) decided to prosecute the Untergunther restorers for breaking a lock on one of the Panthéon’s doors, even though they also acknowledged that the restoration of the clock had been carried out skilfully. However, the restorers were cleared of all charges – leaving them free to start work on another top-secret project…

Undercover restorers fix Paris landmark’s clock — The Guardian

Untergunther website

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