Reformierte Kirche Wädenswil, Protestant church in Wädenswil, Switzerland
The Reformed Church of Wädenswil is a late-Baroque transverse church built by Johann Ulrich Grubenmann, with a 36-metre-long nave and a tower reaching 64 metres. Its two-storey facades are divided by sandstone pilasters and cornices and finished in pastel tones, with oval Rococo skylights above the round-arched windows and portals crowned by curved Baroque hoods.
Built between 1764 and 1767, the church replaced an earlier Romanesque structure that had stood on this site since the 12th century. Its construction marked the shift to modern reformed church design of that period.
The village decided in 1529 to join the Reformation, and all altars were removed only in 1540. The church was financed by selling Kirchenörter, and at the 1767 dedication the report noted that "alle Stegen und Gäng mit Menschen angefüllt" were. The five-voice bell ringing and the tower clock by the Ungerer brothers of 1862 still mark the days.
The north and west portals are reached by outdoor flights of stairs, while the tower portal has a wrought-iron gate by the Wädenswil smith Dietzinger. Inside, a swing door in the tower vestibule separates the entrance from the nave, and a side door leads to the upper tower floors.
Legend holds that Grubenmann convinced the church council of his roof design's load-bearing capacity by climbing onto the wooden church model he had built himself. The 1764–1767 church was financed through the sale of church seats.
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