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St. Gallen (; French Saint-Gall; Italian San Gallo) is the capital of the Canton of St. Gallen in Switzerland. It evolved from the hermitage of Saint Gall founded in the 7th century. Nowadays it is a large urban agglomeration (with around 160,000 inhabitants) and presents the center of eastern Switzerland. The town mainly relies on services for its economic base. The city has good transport links to the rest of the country and to neighbouring Germany and Austria. It especially functions as the gate to the Appenzell mountain area. Main tourist attraction is the Abbey of St. Gall, which belongs with its renowned library (with books dating back to the 9th century) to the UNESCO cultural heritage. Notable buildings include:
Geography St. Gallen is situated in the north-eastern part of Switzerland in a valley around 700 meters above sea level. It is one of the highest cities in Switzerland and can receive quite a lot of snow in winter. The town is nicely situated between the Lake of Constance and the mountains of the Alpstein (with the Säntis as the highest peak at about 2500 meters) and therefore offers excellent recreation areas nearby. As the city center actually rises on an unstable turf ground (thanks to its founder Gallus who was looking for a hermitage and not founding a city), all buildings on the valley floor have to be built on pales - as e.g. the whole train station and its plaza that are based on hundreds of pales. Founding of the City The founding of St. Gallen is based on the Irish monk Gallus ( Founding of the Abbey of St. Gallen Around 720, one hundred years after Gallus' death, the alemannian priest Othmar built an abbey and gave it the name St. Gallen (see: Abbey of St. Gall). Reformation Starting in 1526 then-mayor and humanist Joachim von Watt (Vadian) introduced the reformation in the city of St. Gallen. The Two Golden Ages In the 15th century St. Gallen became successful in producing textiles. In 1714 the climax was reached with a yearly production of 38'000 pieces of cloth. The first depression happened in the middle of the 18th century caused by strong foreign competition and starting cotton production. But St. Gallen was able to catch up and an even more glamorous era arrived. At the beginning of the 19th century, the first embroidery machines were developed in St. Gallen. In 1910 the embroidery production was the largest export branch (18 percent of the total export value) in Switzerland and more than 50(!) percent of the global production originated in St. Gallen. One fifth of the population in the eastern part of Switzerland lived from the textile industry. World War I and the Great Depression thereafter let the St. Gallen embroidery fall into a second large crisis. Only in the 1950s a slight recovery started in the textile industry. Nowadays, only a small textile industry can survive in St. Gallen because of high specialization and the production of powerful embroidery machines. St. Gallen embroideries (e.g. by Akris) are still in high demand by the creators of Paris Haute Couture. Education St.Gallen is famous for its university, aptly named University of St. Gallen (HSG). It is the number one school for business and management in German-speaking Europe and one of the top addresses worldwide. As a focused university that only offers degrees in business and management, economics, political science & international relations as well as business law, it is comparatively small, with about 5,000 students matriculated at present. It is both EQUIS and AACSBA accredited, and a member of CEMS (Community of European Management Schools). The university maintains student and faculty exchange programs around the world. Furthermore, St. Gallen is also known for a world famous private school, namely, Institut auf dem Rosenberg - an elite boarding school attracting students from all over the world. Theater
Museums Music Buildings Parks Regular Events Transportation The A1 motorway links St. Gallen with St. Margrethen, Zürich, Bern and Geneva. In 1987 the city motorway was opened, which leads the traffic through two tunnels (Rosenberg and Stefanshorn) almost directly below the city center. St. Gallen has its own small airport Airport St. Gallen-Altenrhein, residing at nearby Lake of Constance with regular flights to Vienna and other destinations. St. Gallen is closely tied to the national Swiss Federal Railways net and has InterCity connections to Zurich and the Zurich International Airport every half an hour. St. Gallen is the hub for many private railways such as the Südostbahn (SOB), connecting St. Gallen with Lucerne, the Appenzeller Bahnen with connections to Appenzell and the Trogenerbahn to Trogen, which also serves as a tram in downtown. The town has a dense local bus transportation system operated by the VBSG, which is well established on the valley floor and less on the hills. As St. Gallen is located near the Appenzell mountain area, it offers also many Postauto (post bus) connections. The agglomeration disposes also of its own S-Bahn System (overground local trains). The large urban area Zurich is about 80km south-west of St. Gallen and is reachable by car in about 50 minutes and by train in 69 minutes (by ICN). Trivia In St. Gallen, there is the oldest brewery of Switzerland called Schützengarten. Gustav Adolf, former king of Sweden, spent the last years of his life in St. Gallen, and finally died there in 1837. Newspaper articles Auf Pantoffeln in goldene Zeiten in St. Galler Tagblatt | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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