The building has served its intended purpose, i.e. it has been used as a school - continuously to this day.

History

In 1860, the Merchants' Assembly of Lublin decided to set up a commercial school. After many efforts, the school finally came into being in 1866 as a 4-grade Sunday Commercial School.

The founders of the school bought an area formerly occupied by a Bernardine monastery and intended to build a school there. The construction of the school building started in 1905. The building was designed by Teofil Wiśniowski and Józef Holewiński - architects from Warsaw. 

The building in an eclectic style with predominantly neo-Gothic elements was completed in 1907. The school was built mostly thanks to the efforts of August and Juliusz Vetter - industrialists and merchants from Lublin, who (August and then Juliusz) served as the president of the Tutelary Board of the Lublin Commercial School.

The idea of sharing with other people, proclaimed among the members of the Evangelical church to which they belonged, was the driving force behind the creation of the school.

The existence of that school was all the more important, because it was the first secondary school in the Congress Kingdom to use Polish as the language of instruction. The best professors were hired in order to ensure the highest level of education. Its graduates were accepted by all universities of Galicia, Prussia, France, Belgium and Switzerland. The school reduced its tuition fees in order to provide educational support to talented young people from poor families. In recognition of the merits of the Vetter brothers, August and Juliusz Vetter scholarships were established and the school received the name of the brothers August and Juliusz Vetter.

From the south, the school building is adjoined by a townhouse, which was erected in 1913 (16 Bernardyńska Street).

From the very beginning, the building has been continuously used as a school (with the exception of the years of the First World War, when a hospital was organised in the classrooms). 

Since 1975, the school has functioned as the August and Juliusz Vetter Economic School Complex.

Description

The building has a wide front elevation and is situated at No. 14 Bernardyńska Street. From the south-east, its corner is adjoined by the townhouse at No. 16 Bernardyńska Street, with a school playground behind it. On the north-western side, there are fragments of the former Bernardine monastery. The building is made of solid ceramic bricks. The main body of the building is covered with a queen post roof truss with vertical roof load bearing structures. Over the wings, there are knee walls. The roof is covered with tiles. Brick ceilings are supported by steel beams and reinforced concrete slabs. On the ground floor, there is a groin vault over the hall. Most of the original two-wing and three-wing windows in wooden, chambranle frames, have been replaced with modern ones. Two-wing wood panel doors include both unglazed and glazed ones. The main door is multi-panel and profiled.

The building was erected on a floor plan of an elongated rectangle. At the front, there are two avant-corpses with entrances. On the eastern side, there are two perpendicular side wings. 

The building has three storeys, cellars and a usable attic. The main parts of the building are covered with gable roofs. In the outermost parts, there are three-span roofs. 

The 20-axial front elevation is plastered up to the middle of the first floor, with unplastered brickwork above. There are also two three-axial avant-corpses. On the axis in the northern avant-corps, there is the main entrance preceded by steps, surmounted by a four-column portico in the Ionic order, with a full entablature, topped with a gable in the form of a baluster railing between the pedestals. The avant-corps is enclosed by corner buttresses and topped with a triangular gable with an arcaded surround. The ground floor of the avant-corps and the main body are rusticated horizontally and have buttresses in the lintels. The windows on both sides of the portico are topped with a semi-circular arch.

On the upper storeys of the elevations of the avant-corps, the panels are terminated with a trefoil arch. In the panels, there are rectangular windows (1st floor) and windows terminated with a segmental arch (2nd floor). In the triangular gable, there are two windows with semi-circular arches, with a frieze decorated with floral motifs, as well as a stepped arcade and pedestals supported by corbels, with geometric-floral forms. The southern avant-corps is shallow and three-axial. It has a portal with a keystone in the lintel, topped with a cornice. The panels of the avant-corps are topped with a semi-circular arch. The gable follows the same design as in the northern avant-corps. In other parts of the elevations of the main body, there are windows terminating in segmental arches, with a keystone in the lintel (high basements). Above, there are lintels with an external stepped pattern.

Divisions between storeys are accentuated with cornices. The whole is topped with a profiled crowning cornice and an arcaded frieze with stone gargoyles between the bays. There are dormers inserted into the roof slope. 

North-western elevation is seven-axial and follows the same design as the front one, with a shallow avant-corps, whose width encompasses three axes. On the extreme axis, there is a drive-through gate. The rear elevation and the side, south-eastern elevation (the one facing the playing-field) are plastered and decorated with cornices.

The side can be viewed from outside. The interiors can be visited (upon prior arrangement) during the school hours. 

compiled by Anna Sikora-Terlecka, National Institute of Cultural Heritage, Branch Office in, 12 April 2017

Bibliography

• Boruch W., Szkoła Handlowa im. Vetterów w Lublinie, mps. Zespół badań Hist. 1994, Voivodeship Office for the Protection of Historic Monuments in Lublin, ref. 5441
• Bownik Z., Z dziejów Szkół im. A. i J. Vetterów w Lublinie. Lublin 1958,
• Poznański K., Szkoły im. A. i J. Vetterów w Lublinie. Lublin 1985,
• Kącki T., Przełomowych lat kronika Zespołu Szkół Ekonomicznych im. A. i J. Vetterów w Lublinie 1974-1992. Lublin 1992,
• Kącki T., Nauczyciele Szkół im. A. i J. Vetterów w Lublinie 1866-1996. Przeszli do historii Szkół Vetterów. Lublin 1996,
• Kącki T., Szkoły im. A. i J. Vetterów w Lublinie i ich uczniowie 1866-2000. Lublin 2000.
• Wyszyński H., Zarys historii szkół im. A. i J. Vetterów w Lublinie. Przewodnik po dziejach szkoły i kupiectwa lubelskiego w latach 1866-2006. Lublin 2006.