St Gertrude's Chapel in Koszalin

St Gertrude's Chapel on Modrzejewskiej Street in Koszalin is a brick building on an octagonal plan, erected, according to the Wikipedia entry, in 1383 outside the town walls. Over the centuries it changed its purpose, and today it is a church of the Evangelical-Augsburg parish and a monument entered in the heritage register.

A cemetery chapel on an octagonal plan

It was originally a cemetery church. The octagonal shape referred to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, which was meant to give the faithful hope of life after death and of salvation. In 1534 the chapel became the property of the Evangelical church, and in 1662 it was renovated under the direction of David Hille.

Ammunition store, warehouse and theatre stage

In 1735 the chapel was converted into an ammunition store. The shingle roof was then replaced with tiles, the tower was pulled down and the windows were bricked up. At the end of the 19th century the building served as a warehouse. At the beginning of the 20th century it returned to the role of a church, this time of the Old Lutheran Church, and the roof in its present form dates from then. After 1945 the chapel again lost its sacred character.

In the 1960s it housed storerooms of the nearby theatre, later the Small Stage of the Baltic Drama Theatre was based here, and the interior displayed works by pupils of the Koszalin Art School. The building's present appearance is the result of a renovation in 1988. In 1999 the chapel passed to the Evangelical-Augsburg parish, and on 7 May 2000 it was consecrated as a church.

What the building looks like

The walls are pierced by pointed-arch windows with tracery and two stepped entrance portals. At the corners stand eight double-stepped buttresses. In the upper part of the façade, above the entrances, there are blind arcades decorated with rosettes, and under the eaves runs a frieze of brick shaped into a four-leaf clover. The vault is a stellar one, and from outside it is covered by an eight-sided pyramidal spire topped with a finial on an octagonal drum.

Nearby

The chapel stands in the town centre, about four hundred metres from the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

In the same area lies the Park of the Pomeranian Dukes, so the chapel is easy to include in a walk around the town centre.

Practical information

• Location: Koszalin, Modrzejewskiej Street.
• The building is a church of the Evangelical-Augsburg parish, and it was entered in the heritage register in 1956.
• The hours when visitors can go inside are set by the parish. Check them before your visit.