About the site
At the far end of Olomoucká Street, some distance from the built-up area of the time, two large pavilion-type hospital complexes with landscaped grounds were constructed in the late 19th century — first the Provincial Psychiatric Hospital (1886–1889) and then the Provincial Hospital (1897–1900). This “medical district”, expanded in 1912–1913 by Dr Fritz Pendl’s private sanatorium, was complemented at the end of the 1920s by a nursing school built by the Congregation of the Sisters of Mercy of the Third Order of St. Francis. Standing on land purchased from the Provincial Administrative Commission directly next to the hospital, it responded to the growing need for qualified nursing staff, especially after the First World War.
The project was initiated under the Provincial Building Authority, but after the authority was dissolved and architect Karl Gottwald took early retirement, he completed it as an independent designer. The three-winged, four-storey building (including the attic), laid out on an H-shaped plan, was oriented towards Olomoucká Street. The main wing was emphasized by a risalit with an attached terrace and a pair of side staircases giving access to the elevated refectory. Behind it was a chapel dedicated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, with a pentagonal apse and a tower aligned with the main wing. The chapel was connected to the side wings by arcaded galleries and decorated by painters Adolf Zdrazila and Raimund Mosler, and sculptor Engelbert Kaps. The first floor of the main wing housed guest rooms. The south-west wing was used as the nurses’ home (cloister), while the north-east wing accommodated the nursing school, with its own entrance from Sušilova Street. This entrance was marked by a massive risalit with a triangular pediment, its ground floor opened by a five-bay arcade with capitals carved in relief with nuns’ heads, probably by Gottwald’s frequent collaborator Adolf Köhrer. Between the second-floor windows was a decorative baroque-style cartouche with a quotation from the First Epistle of St. Paul to the Corinthians by sculptor Josef Obeth, who also created the statue of St. Francis on the façade of the south-west wing. This statue now stands on a plinth in front of the terrace of the main wing. The ground floor contained, besides the monumental three-flight staircase, the chaplain’s apartment and rooms for the student Sisters; the first floor had a lecture hall and additional rooms; the second floor housed the library with a reading room and large study hall. The basement contained the technical facilities: kitchen, laundry room, ironing room, tailoring workshop, and cellars. The interiors were designed to evoke a monastic atmosphere inspired by Baroque architecture, with monumental staircases, wrought-iron railings, and other details. The main wing had a two-tract layout, the side wings three-tract.
Construction began in October 1928, and the building was consecrated in January 1930. The building was heavily damaged during the bombing of Opava in December 1944, which destroyed the chapel and part of the east wing. Repairs carried out in 1945 were only provisional. In 1960, the Sisters of Mercy were forced to leave, and the complex became part of the hospital under the administration of the District Institute of National Health, which between 1974 and 1977 added a south-east wing. The chapel and arcaded galleries, were not rebuilt, the former being replaced by a single-storey annex. In 1992, the Franciscaneum was returned to the Congregation, which now leases it to private medical providers.
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