A rooftop pool on Notre Dame? Architects come up with ideas to rebuild the iconic Paris landmark

The ideas are rolling in for how Notre Dame should be rebuilt - and one includes a swimming pool on its roof.

Architects competing to be commissioned to redesign are submitting their proposals for the iconic Paris landmark, which was gutted by fire last month.

The blaze saw the roof of the cathedral completely destroyed and prompted an array of people to donate millions of Euros for it to be rebuilt.

French President Emmanuel Macron vowed to rebuild the cathedral “even more beautifully” within five years and French Prime Minister Edouard Philippe lannounced an international competition for architects to rebuild the spire.

Suggestions submitted so far include a version with a rooftop swimming pool from Stockholm-based Ulf Mejergren Architects (UMA).

An image of the company’s innovative design shared on Instagram has already garnered 60,000 likes.

The company wrote on its website: “Most proposals that we have seen puts way too much focus and effort on the spire; a rather recent addition built in the 19th century renovation.

“We think that the cathedral looks much better without both the spire and the led-clad roof. Instead we let the bell towers, the flying buttresses and the rose windows do the talking.

The company said it is proposing a “meditative public space” and “a complementary spatial experience to the building with unmatched views over Paris”.

“The spire is gone, but the twelve statues of the apostles that where put away during the restoration and managed to escape the fire, are once again back at the roof, now as guardians around a large public pool that occupies the whole roof.

“Maybe the pool will be replaced in a hundred years or so, becoming another layer of great stories for the future.”

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Another design from Paris-based Vincent Callebaut Architectures which proposed an eco-friendly building with a curved spire.

The company said it wants to undertake an “exemplary project in ecological engineering that feels true to its time and avoids a pastiche architecture that turns the city into an open-air museum”.

Other proposals come from French firm Studio NAB which suggested a giant greenhouse roof complete with apiary to house hundreds of thousands of bees that survived the blaze despite their hives being on the roof.

A garden design with a glass roof was also submitted by architects at Miysis, while British architect Norman Foster has suggested a pyramid-shaped spire in crystal and stainless steel.