The early Gothic builders used innovative technologies to resolve the problem of masonry ceilings which were too heavy for the traditional arched barrel vault.

It combined several existing technologies, notably the rib vault, pointed arch, flying buttress, to build much higher and thinner walls, which allowed more space for stained glass windows and more light in the interior.

It combined and developed several key elements from earlier styles, particularly from Romanesque architecture, including the rib vault, flying buttress, and the pointed arch, and used them in innovative ways to create structures, particularly Gothic cathedrals and churches, of exceptional height and grandeur, filled with light from stained glass windows.

[8] Early English Gothic was influenced by the French style, particularly in the new choir of Canterbury Cathedral, but soon developed its own particular characteristics, particularly an emphasis for length over height, and more complex and asymmetric floor plans, square rather than rounded east ends, and polychrome decoration, using Purbeck marble.

To accommodate the large number of pilgrims, Suger first constructed a new narthex and façade at the west end, with twin towers and a rose window in the centre.

[11] He described the finished work as "a circular string of chapels, by virtue of which the whole church would shine with the wonderful and uninterrupted light of most luminous windows, pervading the interior beauty.

[11] The Basilica, including the upper parts of the choir and the apse, were extensively modified into the Rayonnant style in the 1230s, but the original early Gothic ambulatory and chapels can still be seen.

The new cathedral still had many Romanesque features, including prominent transepts with rounded ends and deep galleries, but it introduced several Gothic innovations, including the fourth level, the triforium a narrow passageway between the ground-level gallery, the tribunes, and the top level clerestory, Noyon also used massive compound piers alternating with round columns, necessary because of the uneven weight distribution from the six-part vaults.

Another unusual feature at Laon is the lantern tower at the transept crossing, most likely inspired by the Norman Gothic abbey churches in Caen.

The cathedral immediately previous to the present church burned in 1194, leaving only the crypt, towers, and the recently built west front.

[26] Since the cathedral was constructed with the new flying buttresses, the walls were more stable, enabling the builders to eliminate the tribune level, and have more space for windows.

This meant that the weight of the vaults fell unevenly upon the nave, and required, like Early Gothic cathedrals, alternating strong and weak pillars.

The Bourges buttresses used a unique design with a particularly acute angle, which gave it the necessary force, but it was also reinforced by thicker and stronger walls than Chartres.

[28] The most unusual feature of Bourges Cathedral is the arrangement of vertical height; each part of the elevation is set back, like steps, with the highest roof and vaults over the central aisle.

Newer and lighter versions of the rib vault, using small pieces of cut stone in the panels, rather than plastered rubble, were developed in Normandy and the Ile-de-France.

A fire destroyed the mainly Romanesque choir in September 1174, and leading architects from England and France were invited to offer plans for its reconstruction.

Nonetheless, he achieved a strikingly original sculpture, showing elements inspired by Notre-Dame de Paris and Laon Cathedral.

Following the French model, he used six-part rib vaults, pointed arches, supporting columns with carved acanthus leaf decoration, and a semi-circular ambulatory.

But it also retained many specifically English features, such as a great variety in the level and placement of the spaces; the Trinity chapel, for example is sixteen steps above the Choir).

Similar complicated multifunctional designs were found not only in Canterbury, but in the abbey-churches of Bath, Coventry, Durham, Ely, Norwich, Rochester, Winchester and Worcester.

The screen facade of the west front is filled with nearly four hundred carved and painted stone figure, and is made more impressive by two flanking towers, attached to but not part of the body of the church.

Salisbury is best known for its famous crossing tower and spire, added in the 14th century, but its complex plan, with two sets of transepts, a projecting north porch and a rectangular east end, is a classic example of the early English Gothic.

[39] The plans of the early English Gothic cathedrals were usually longer and much more complex, with additional transepts, attached chapels, external towers, and usually a rectangular west end.

The early Gothic buttresses were placed close to the walls, and were columns of stone with a short arch to the upper level, between the windows.

The Abbot Suger commissioned stained glass windows for the Basilica of Saint-Denis to fill the ambulatory and chapels with what he considered to be divine light.

The molten glass was coloured with metal oxides; cobalt for blue, copper for red, iron for green, manganese for purple and antimony for yellow.

When molten, it was blown into a bubble, formed into a tubular shape, cut at the ends to make a cylinder, then slit and flattened while it was still hot.

They had been used in Romanesque architecture, such as the two small windows on the facade of Pomposa Abbey in Italy (early 10th century), but they became more important and complex in the Gothic period.

[48] The rose windows of the Early Gothic churches were composed of plate tracery, a geometric pattern of openings in stone over the central portal.

Other examples are the rose on the west front of Laon Cathedral and Notre Dame de Mantes (1210)[48] York Minster has what is believed to be the oldest existing stained glass window in England, a Tree of Jesse (1170).