One of the most beautiful buildings in Vyborg is the Old Town Hall on the square of the same name. This elegant building was erected back in 1643, and at that time the Town Hall, where the local self-government bodies met, became the largest structure in the city overall. Usually, the Town Hall refers to the building on the Old Town Hall Square, right in front of the entrance to which stands a monument to Torgils Knutsson.
Officially, Vyborg obtained the right to have a city self-government body in 1403, but the Town Hall building did not appear immediately. When the Swedish king Gustav Vasa visited the city in 1555, the need to build a Town Hall was raised. The first Town Hall was wooden and burned down in 1628. The Town Hall building that has survived to this day was built in 1643, originally two stories high and the most spacious in the city. It was erected on the square near the so-called Round Gates at the entrance to Vyborg from the west. Since, unlike the previous magistrate building, the Town Hall did not have a traditional tower, a separately standing tower of the city fortifications, which had lost its defensive significance, was assigned to it. During military actions in 1710, Russian artillery severely damaged it, and a new building was allocated for the Town Hall, while the old one was used for various other purposes. In 1898, the Town Hall was restored in the Neo-Renaissance style and significantly enlarged: to accommodate the exhibitions of the historical and ethnographic museum, the number of floors was increased to four.
According to the law of King Magnus, six burgomasters and a city council of 30 members were to meet in the Vyborg Town Hall, but in practice, no more than four burgomasters and 8-10 council members were elected in Vyborg. Half of the council members (ratmans), according to the 1471 law, were to be Germans, and the other half locals. From the mid-17th century, the legislation changed: the city council became known as the magistrate. Vyborg was entitled to three burgomasters and eight ratmans, but the townspeople usually elected two burgomasters and six council members. The Vyborg magistrate met almost daily. Its representatives regularly attended parliamentary sessions in Stockholm. In addition to the magistrate, four collegia held sessions in the Town Hall: judicial, commercial, financial, as well as the collegium of construction and guilds.
Descending into the basement, visitors would enter the wine cellar: on the right, in a room with a tiled stove, merchants and other wealthy townspeople rested, and on the left, in a room with a chimney — the more modest public. Sometimes, interactions among its visitors ended in fights, and subsequent investigations took place right there, but on other floors of the building.
After the construction of new official premises (magistrate), the former Town Hall repeatedly changed its purpose throughout the 19th century, and in 1898 it was reconstructed according to architect Blomkvist’s project in the Neo-Renaissance style: the third and mansard floors were added to adapt it for the Vyborg Historical and Ethnographic Museum, opened in 1895, whose collection was mainly composed of paintings and antiques donated to the city by the patron Gromme. In 1908, a monument to Torgils Knutsson was installed on the square in front of the building.
The former Town Hall was severely damaged during the Soviet-Finnish War (1939–1940), and the museum exhibits were destroyed by fire, while the figure of Knutsson was removed. It was restored in the post-war period and converted into residential apartments, which are still inhabited today. In 1985, the Old Vyborg Town Hall was entered into the register of cultural heritage sites, but in the post-war years, the building was restored and in 1958 adapted into a residential building with the reconstruction of the mansard floor and alteration of the roof shape. The reconstruction lasted more than 30 years. The construction process was halted several times. The stairs, spire, ceilings, and window openings were restored. The exterior was recreated in the Neo-Renaissance style. By 1984, the monument was partially restored, and the sculpture of Torgils was returned to its place in 1993. This coincided with the 700th anniversary of Vyborg Castle.
The Old Town Hall Square is the most charming in the city. Here you can see the guardhouse building, built in the Classicism style and later remodeled in Neo-Gothic; the former Vekrut House; the Borchardt merchant house, rebuilt in the Neo-Renaissance style; several Wolf houses combined into one; as well as the statues "Maritime Trade" and "Industry" from the second half of the 19th century on the site where the city gates once stood.
Sources:
https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/Выборгская_ратуша
https://tonkosti.ru/%D0%92%D1%8B%D0%B1%D0%BE%D1%80%D0%B3%D1%81%D0%BA%D0%B0%D1%8F_%D0%A0%D0%B0%D1%82%D1%83%D1%88%D0%B0
https://rekvizit.info/blogs/vyborgskaya-ratusha/
