Brother Klaus Church angles
The Bruder-Klaus-Kirche Winkeln is the Catholic church in the St. Gallen district of Winkeln . It was built between 1958 and 1959 and is dedicated to the holy brother Klaus . The architectural style is extremely modern. Architects were Ernest Brantschen and Alfons Weisser from St. Gallen. The extremely complicated calculation of the landmark of the church, the pillarless concrete roof, was done by Heinz Hossdorf from Basel. Because of the strange shape of the roof, the church is popularly known as the soul launch pad .
history
In the mid-1950s the economic importance of the previously very small hamlet in Winkeln increased significantly. Many industrial companies settled in the area, as there was enough building land available on the plain west of the Sitter. Along with the factories, workers and employees also increasingly moved to this quarter. The quarter did not yet have its own church, so that some churchgoers had to walk long distances to Bruggen or Abtwil.
For example, an architecture competition was held in order to be able to build the district's own church. The church should be markedly different from the construction workers' settlements and industrial buildings. The project by Brantschen and Weisser was awarded the contract, but initially with some skepticism, as the feasibility was not guaranteed.
The foundation stone of the church was laid in 1958, the inscription MCMLVIII is clearly visible next to the entrance. On September 27, 1959, the church was consecrated to holy brother Klaus by Bishop Joseph Hasler of St. Gallen .
In preparation for the holy year 2000, the roof was extensively renovated. For political reasons (the additional costs would have required a referendum under the current law), further renovation work was postponed until later. This caused displeasure among many members of the parish, especially because expensive scaffolding had to be built to renovate the roof, with which the outer wall could also have been repainted.
In 2005 the church was completely renovated and repainted inside and out. As architects for the renovation recorded Pius and Walter Gemperli responsible. The originally white walls, which had turned gray to almost black over time, now appear bright and clear again. The walls clearly brighten the interior. Since the windows are very small, this effect is particularly visible, even when artificial light is used (which is practically always required). Alfons Weisser, the original architect of the church, was impressed by the work on a tour of the construction site.
architecture
Probably because of the striking break with the church architecture of previous decades that Le Corbusier demonstrated when building the Notre-Dame-du-Haut pilgrimage church near Ronchamp two years earlier, Weisser and Brantschen decided on a construction that was revolutionary at the time. All walls are made of exposed concrete, some whitewashed. The colored windows created by various artists are very small and let the room appear in permanent colored twilight when the spotlights are switched off.
The roughly square floor plan of the church is spanned by an originally only 7 cm thick concrete roof, which is braced with the meter-thick outer walls in the corners. During the renovation work before 2000, the ceiling was provided with an additional layer of foam for better thermal insulation.
Since the responsible engineer Heinz Hossdorf did not have a computer with sufficient computing power to calculate the complex statics of the roof structure in 1958 , he had to help himself with several model tests. He rebuilt the roof construction to scale, initially from plastic, later from reinforced mortar, over a full water bath. Then he hung the roof with a matrix of bars with weights and floats at the end. When the water has now been drained, the roof should not tear and also behave elastically, i.e. it should return to its original shape when the weights are removed.
The choir room of the church appears very bare without decoration. The only thing standing next to the altar is the tabernacle ; on the large back wall is the small-looking cross and underneath it in a niche that was originally intended for the exposure of the monstrance , an abstraction of Brother Klaus' wheel.
The campanile contains a ringing of five bells . These were cast in Heidelberg on April 28, 1959 .
| No. | Surname | Weight | diameter | Chime |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Trinity Bell | 2,400 kg | 151 cm | c 1 |
| 2 | Marien - or Ave bell | 1'350 kg | 126 cm | it 1 |
| 3 | Brother Clause Bell | 950 kg | 112 cm | f 1 |
| 4th | Barbara bell | 700 kg | 100 cm | g 1 |
| 5 | Guardian angel bell | 400 kg | 85 cm | b 1 |
The neighboring parish hall, which originally also served as a rectory, was built in the same style as the church by E. Grünenfelder.
The church received federal subsidies for the renovation in 2005 and is therefore under federal protection. This is extremely rare for a building from the 1950s.
literature
- Art Guide No. 806, Verlag Schnell & Steiner, Regensburg 2009 (2nd edition), ISBN 978-3-7954-4530-0
Web links
- Pictures of the renovation in September 2005 ( Memento from December 12, 2005 in the Internet Archive )
- Bruder-Klaus-Kirche Winkeln on the ETHorama platform
Coordinates: 47 ° 24 '8.4 " N , 9 ° 18' 7.9" E ; CH1903: 740,662 / 251838