Church and monastery of St. Mary Magdalene
House of Organ and Chamber Music, Church and Monastery of Mary Magdalene
Ukraine, Lviv
The House of Organ and Chamber Music is a Lviv cultural institution founded in the 1960s. Former church and monastery of St. Mary Magdalene. It is located at the crossroads of Bandera and Doroshenko streets. Address: Ukraine, Lviv, Bandery street, 10.
In 1600, the owner of the site, called "100 fields", A. Pstrokonskaya donated the land, along with the yard and garden, to the Dominican monks for the construction of a seminary. Against the decision of the magistrate, the monks began to build a wooden church. The city authorities opposed it, since the fortified place on the mountain, falling into the hands of the enemy, could pose a danger to Lviv and the church lands were not taxed.
The building of the Roman Catholic Church of St. Mary Magdalene was built between 1600 and 1612 by Dominican monks outside the city walls to the south of the city walls of Lviv, on the site of an old wooden church. A seminary and cells of the monastery were built nearby. The authors of the project were architects A. Kelar and J. Godny. Construction was completed in 1635.
In 1648, the monastery fortifications, as well as the nearby monastery of St. Lazarus, were captured by the troops of Bohdan Khmelnitsky. Since then, the building has undergone several changes. In 1754-1758 the church was expanded and rebuilt by the architect M.Urbanik, the facades were changed, the towers were completed. During the secularization reform of the Austrian Emperor Joseph II in 1786, the church was made a parish, and a prison for women of easy virtue was established in the monastery (closed in 1922).
The church acquired its present form in 1870. The structure is a three-nave, six-pillar basilica with an elongated choir and an apse, which are covered with cross vaults. The architecture of the building combines elements of baroque and renaissance styles. In 1932, a Rieger-Kloss organ made in the Czech Republic was installed here. It is the largest in Ukraine. Since 1962, the building of the church housed a sports hall for some time, and the cell building was transferred to the use of the Lviv Polytechnic (building No. 16).
Since 1998, Roman Catholic services have been held in the building again. The Roman Catholic community of St. Mary Magdalene is seeking the complete transfer of the building into their hands.