St. Antonius (Wildegg)

Sankt Antoniuskirche, in the background Wildegg Castle

Entrance area

The St. Antonius Church is the parish church of the Roman Catholic parish Wildegg within the parish of Lenzburg . It is located in Möriken-Wildegg in the canton of Aargau . The church, which was built from 1968 to 1969, with its unusual round tent architecture, is an important building piece of modernism in Switzerland.

History and naming

In the high Middle Ages, the area of Lenzburg and Möriken belonged to the large parish of Staufberg and later to the parish of Lenzburg, which was separated from it. In Möriken there was a smaller branch church on the edge of the slope north of the Bünz , which was already dedicated to St. Anthony and which was replaced by the new Reformed Church around 1950 . Its oldest bell bears the name of the church patron and the date from 1400: «st. Antonni.ora.pronobis.anno.dom.m.cccc ». It is one of the oldest dated bells in the canton of Aargau.

After the Reformation in 1529, Catholic worship was prohibited in the subject area of Bern and thus also in Bern's Aargau until the 18th century. It was not until the early 19th century that the canton of Aargau approved the reintroduction of the Catholic cult because, with industrialization, Catholic workers and their families had come to the Aare area from Central Switzerland and other parts of the country.

In 1892 the Roman Catholic church cooperative built their first church in the district capital for all Catholics in the Lenzburg district. In 1934 she had the larger church in Lenzburg built by the architects Gerster & Meyer in Laufen .

The new Catholic parish church in Wildegg is consecrated to St. Anthony of Padua .

Planning and building history

In 1925, as a precautionary measure, the domestic mission acquired a plot of land in Wildegg on the Strohegg hill above the Aare and Bünztal valleys. In 1950 the parish of Lenzburg approved a planning loan for the construction of the Wildegg church. In 1951, after consultation with the diocesan bishop, she first built a provisional small church made of wood for the Catholics of the communities of Möriken-Wildegg, Holderbank and Auenstein . The small bell of the emergency church was dedicated to St. Brother Klaus consecrated. The rectory near the church dates from 1958.

In 1965 the parish of Lenzburg set up a new church building commission. On March 17, 1966, she awarded the planning contract to the Zurich architect Justus Dahinden and on October 9, 1967, she approved the building loan.

After the groundbreaking ceremony on March 11, 1968, the foundation stone was laid on October 20, 1968. With the consecration of the bells cast by the H. Rüetschi bell foundry in Aarau on March 16, 1969 and the consecration of the church on November 1, 1969, the building was given its intended purpose.

Since September 11, 1999, the former parish rectorate Wildegg has been an independent parish within the Lenzburg parish. In 2001 the parish carried out a comprehensive renovation of the building.

description

The church building is located in a prominent place on the slope edge above the level of the old meadow landscape and above the Bünztal. It forms the counterpart to the Reformed parish church of Möriken, which is built on an opposite ledge.

From Wildegg and from the Bünz lowland, the Lauéstrasse leads up to the church on the hill. After walking around three quarters of the way around the building, those arriving reach the entrance area, which presents itself as a fairly wide inner courtyard. The round square, surrounded by high brick and copper walls, is cut out of the church floor plan.

The shape of the church building appears with the numerous sloping roof and wall surfaces all around like a wide, polygonal tent. This impression is reinforced by the homogeneous material of the roof membrane made of strips. According to Justus Dahinden's concept, plastic was originally intended for the shell, but the cantonal insurance office prohibited such a design, whereupon the architect and parish chose copper cladding. On the north side, the outer edge goes up to a prominent elevation that forms a small bell tower.

The church is located on a concrete basement and consists of a partly concreted, partly brick walled western massif next to the inner courtyard and the wooden supporting structure above the church interior. This has a floor plan of an irregular semicircle, the multiple angled outer wall of which is only interrupted by a few window strips. Star-shaped, narrow wooden beams support the roof like a tent over the spacious interior.

The complex design was calculated by the engineering office Galleti & Schibli AG, Rupperswil , and implemented with numerous companies from the Lenzburg region, including E. Landis AG, Lenzburg, STUAG, Baden, the Möriken-Wildegg electricity company and G. Kämpf AG from Rupperswil, who carried out the carpentry work, should be mentioned.

The church originally did not have an organ . After a small Kuhn organ was provisionally installed in 1980 , the parish had a new church organ manufactured by Orgelbau Goll AG in Lucerne in 2014 , which was advised by the architect Justus Dahinden during the planning. The instrument has 24 registers (1,346 pipes) on two manual works and a pedal; the Gemshorn 8 'register can be registered on both manuals using an alternating loop. The tremulant affects both manuals. The case is made of solid oak. The playing and stop actions are mechanical.

I Hauptwerk Cg ³ : Bourdon 16 ', Principal 8', Hohlflöte 8 ', Gemshorn 8', Octave 4 ', Traversflöte 4', Octave 2 ', Mixtur 1 ¹ ⁄ ₃  ', Trumpet 8 '
II positive Cg ³ : Bourdon 8 ', Gemshorn 8', Dulciana 8 ', Vox coelestis 8', Fugara 4 ', Rohrflöte 4', Nasat 2 ² ⁄ ₃  ', Flageolet 2', third 1 ³ ⁄ ₅  ', Larigot 1 ¹ ⁄ ₃  ', clarinet 8'
Pedals Cf ¹ : subbass 16 ', principal bass 8', cello 8 ', choral bass 4', bassoon 16 '
Coupling: II / I, I / P, II / P (each as pull and step in interaction)

Appreciation

The Catholic parish church of St. Antonius is listed in the federal inventory of protected cultural assets in Switzerland as an object of national importance.