It was restored in the 16th century and demolished in 1876, and on 23 June 1876 the foundations were laid for a new church in the Neo-Romanesque style. It was formally opened on 9 December 1877. It was a tall building with a tower crowned by a high spire. It had five tall, large windows on each side, a small altar niche and two annexes. The pulpit, made in 1591, and the altar of 1700 were taken from the old church. The organ was installed on 15 April 1881.
In 1945 artillery fire destroyed the church's spire, and the tower itself was damaged too.
In the post-war period it was used as a warehouse. The roof was re-covered with asbestos-cement sheeting. The small sacristy attached to the altar niche was destroyed. All the windows were bricked up. A cross survived at the apex of the gable on the altar side. In 1993 the church was handed over to the Orthodox Church, after which some minor repairs were carried out and services were held in the church from time to time, but soon it was abandoned again (2011).
A real breakthrough in the fortunes of Paterswalde Church came in early 2023, when it was taken on a long-term lease by the founders of a nearby private art residency. The crumbling church has been turned into a fully fledged cultural and exhibition centre, where concerts and other cultural events are held in summer. The regional volunteer movement "Guardians of the Ruins" has not forgotten Paterswalde either.
Photos on this page: Bildarchiv Ostpreußen, bildarchiv-ostpreussen.de
Translated from Russian with the help of AI (Claude, Anthropic), October 2026.
