A three-aisled brick basilica built in 1739–45 after a design by F. Placidi or K. Granacki for the Trinitarians.
A Jesuit school was erected directly next to the church in 1842. After the order’s dissolution in 1848, the school’s building became the seat of the University of Lemberg (from 1851, known as ‘the old university’ seat after 1918), which meant that St Nicholas’ became the university church. In Poland between the world wars, the ‘old university’ at 4 Św. Mikołaja Street housed the institutes of the Faculty of Mathematics and Science.
St Nicholas Church has a gable roof with a little belfry on its central axis, a long rectangular apse, and cross vaults in its interior. The distinctive, dynamic and tall façade is in the Baroque style, as also are the interior furnishings, including the main altar, built by Sebastian Fesinger, and the pulpit in the shape of St Peter’s boat.
It was in this church that the Koffler family (Józef, Róża, and their little son Alban) were baptised by Father Stanisław Narajewski on 24 January 1938. Zofia and Wojciech Gołuchowski acted as godparents.
St Nicholas Parish was one of the largest in Lwów (it extended as far as the area of Stryjski Park), with a congregation of nearly 17,000 in 1929. It comprised the southern part of the city centre, including Chmielowskiego Street, where Koffler then lived. Among the parishioners, there were many Jan Kazimierz University faculty members, including Profs Adolf Chybiński and Jan Czekanowski. During a Sunday mass in 1930, Józef Chomiński conducted Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina’s Missa Papae Marcelli at St Nicholas Church.
