Samuel Werenfels (architect)

Samuel Werenfels (August 4, 1720 – September 11, 1800) was a famous Swiss Baroque architect.

Biography

Early life

Samuel Werenfels, son of Peter Werenfels (businessman and leather glove manufacturer) and Catharina Socin, was born and grew up in Basel. He was grandnephew and godson of the likewise named Swiss theologian Samuel Werenfels. Werenfels was married to Maria Magdalena Strübin.

Career

As an architect, he was renowned for his Rococo designs, an 18th-century French art and interior design style.

In 1743 he joined the Gesellenbruderschaft der Spinnwetternzunft in Basel and became master craftsman in 1748. In 1788 he became mill inspector and from 1794 master-workman in Basel. He died in Basel, aged 80.

The buildings erected in Basel and the surrounding area according to Werenfels' plans, testify his stylistic continuousness to the contemporary Alsatian architecture. Together with Johann Jacob Fechter (1717–1797) and Ulrich Büchel (1753–1792), Werenfels was one of the most distinguished architects and master builders in Basel during the 18th century.

Buildings

Basel

Das Blaue und Das Weisse Haus
Landhaus Ryhiner-Blech (1751)
Haus Zum Delphin (1760)
Haus Zum Dolder (1761)
Posthaus (1773), today this is called the Stadthaus.
Falkensteinerhof (1779)

Surrounding Area

Landhaus Bruckgut in Münchenstein (1758–1761)
Schloss Ebenrain in Sissach (1776)

France

The Parish Church Saint-Rémy (1786) in Hégenheim (Alsace).

References

E. Blum and Th. Nüesch, Basel Einst und Jetzt, 1913, Verlag Hermann Krüsi, page 61
Dorothee Huber, Architekturführer Basel, 2nd edition 1996, Architecture Museum Basel, ISBN 3-905065-22-3, pages 74 to 75
Das Bürgerhaus in der Schweiz, Band XXIII - Kanton Basel-Stadt, 3rd part and Kanton Basel-Land, 1931, Orell Füssli Verlag, pages 24 to 26
Emil Major, Bauten und Bilder aus Basels Kulturgeschichte, 1986, Verlag Peter Heman Basel, ISBN 978-3-85702-010-0, pages 136 and 139