Volksbad St.Gallen (Public Baths)

History: The lifestyles of the majority, including the workers, underwent significant changes in just a few decades. In 1895, the hospital administrator Ehrenzeller recorded a remarkable change: instead of just a few times a year as before, people now bathed every week. To accommodate this social change, St.Gallen secured its water supply in 1895 with the Rietli lake waterworks in Goldach on Lake Constance. The pride in this pioneering achievement is still expressed today in the Broderbrunnen fountain on the Oberer Graben in front of the Multertor and the Stickereibörse. Architecture: Around 1900, only 18 percent of all homes in St.Gallen had their own bathroom. The demand for a public bathing establishment was high. On the initiative of the medical association and workers' organizations such as the Grütli Association and the Workers' Union, the city built the second public indoor swimming pool in Switzerland after Winterthur in 1904-06. In addition to a swimming pool, it also had baths. The construction project by the city architect Albert Pfeiffer was revised several times, with certain guiding principles being pursued: Despite its functional purpose, the public baths were to be pleasantly designed and therefore given a “beautiful, dignified interior”. This requirement was met with the appealing spatial design in a sacred Art Nouveau style and the sculptural decoration by Henri Gisbert Geene. Today's use: The Volksbad St.Gallen is still used today as a municipal indoor swimming pool and still exudes an air of exclusivity. Only around 30 bathers can be accommodated in the Volksbad at any one time, which is nevertheless possible at an affordable admission price. Each guest is also given a lockable changing room to keep valuables safe while he or she relaxes in the water.