Pully, Canton of Vaud, Switzerland

Pully is a Swiss municipality in the canton of Vaud, located in the district of Lavaux-Oron. A dynamic, attractive and friendly city, 7th city of the Canton of Vaud with its 18,495 inhabitants in 2019, adjoins its big sister Lausanne, capital of the Canton of Vaud and second city in French-speaking Switzerland. The commune of Pully covers an area of 594.5 hectares (including large areas of greenery, vineyards and forests). Starting from the shores of Lake Geneva located at an altitude of 372 m, its territory culminates at 806 m.

The town of Pully is located on the shores of Lake Geneva, east of Lausanne. It is part of the Lausanne agglomeration. The altitude of Pully varies from 375 m to 800 m (Mont-de-Pully). Two rivers partly delimit Pully, the Vuachère with Lausanne and the Paudèze with Paudex.

On the shores of Lake Geneva, the town of Pully occupies a central position on the map of Europe. It is served by Geneva international airport (60 km) or a little further by Zurich airport (220 km). The train (TGV or Pendolino) puts Pully less than 4 hours from Paris (500 km) or Milan (350 km), while the motorway network opens the doors to the Swiss and French Alps, or those of neighboring countries.

History
From prehistory to the XXI century Pully has been continuously inhabited since the man Chamblandes the time Neolithic it has its home: archaeologists have discovered Chamblandes the largest set of tombs of the Neolithic period known to this day in Switzerland. The first attestation of occupation of the Pulliéran territory dates back to the Neolithic: tombs, made of stone shuttering, have been found in several places in the town. An important necropolis estimated at about sixty tombs is thus in the district of Chamblandes. These discoveries gave their name to a typology of tombs found near the Alpine massifs from 4300 BC: the Chamblandes type tombs.

Later, it was the Romans who marked their passage, in particular a man named Pollius who would have given his surname to Pully. The remains of a Roman villa believed to have belonged to him are still visible, and constitute the main attraction of the Roman museum of Pully. The historic core of the town of Pully was built on the remains of a very luxurious Roman villa dating from the first half of the 2nd century AD. This one, probably a farm, must have belonged to a wealthy owner, probably a notable of the neighboring agglomeration: Lousonna (Lausanne). Located on an eminence near the lake, the villa was to broadcast, through a port, its productions in the Roman world. The house is abandoned fairly quickly and it was not until 12 th century we find the first certificate named Pulliacum.

A 15-meter-long fresco representing scenes from chariot races was found on the semi-circular pavilion of the Roman Villa. In the 14th century, the Bishop of Lausanne and the family of the Count of Geneva shared sovereignty over the village and its territory. The oldest documents recognizing the “community of Pully” as a legal person, having its own rights, date from 1331. These are medieval parchments indicating the acquisition, by the community of the village of Pully, of land called ” Rovéréaz “located along the Chandelar valley.

During the Burgundy Wars, between 1475 and 1477, the Canton of Vaud was invaded by the Confederates. The Bishop of Lausanne, however, remained the ally of Charles the Bold. Then, in 1536, the Canton was conquered by Bern and Friborg. This conquest led to the Reformation. The government of Bern then seized the Priory in Pully. A century later, between 1629 and 1638, the plague, which raged and ravaged the whole world, took away several hundred Pulliérans.

Bonaparte delivered the Canton of Vaud from the Bernese in 1798 after more than two centuries of occupation. The Priory buildings were confiscated and became the “national house” under the Helvetic Republic. These premises served as a refuge for the French troops who reached Italy by the Grand-Saint-Bernard pass to win the victory of Marengo in 1800. The French emperor offered the Canton of Vaud, in 1803, its first Constitution, at the same time as its entry into the Swiss Confederation. In this same year the election of the first municipality of the Commune of Pully took place. In 1886, Pully acquires an office telegraph, and the first telegraph was appointed to the position M Charlotte Müller.

On May 3, 1902, for the first time, the village of Pully was lit with electricity. The effect was satisfactory, everyone was able to convince themselves of the immense superiority of this lighting compared to petroleum lamps.

The Maison Pulliérane was finished in November 1952, and was inaugurated on October 24, 1953. It is the work of architects Robert Stoll and Robert Oguey, and of engineer Auguste Birschmeiler. It was built on the site of the old Great Hall which had served from 1902 to 1951 and which originally belonged to the Men’s Choir and the Orchestra before the municipality became its owner in 1918. To prevent the imposing mass of the Maison Pulliérane from compromising the harmonious lines of the historic Priory with reinforced concrete, it was decided, for its manufacture, to use molasse and Molière stone in particular. The molasse was extracted from the quarries of, and the Molière stone in Estavayer-le-Lac. The interior coverings of the ground floor are made of Gard stone, and the floor of the vaulted passage is covered with Ticino granite. The bas-relief “Les Vignerons” and the seven keystones are the work of Pierre Blanc.

From a village of winegrowers, fishermen and farmers, Pully, having “exploded” between 1950 and 1970, has become a town of 16,000 inhabitants. The construction of numerous residential buildings makes it a sort of chic residential “suburb” of Lausanne.

Many personalities, painters, novelists, musicians, scientists and poets have lived there and contributed to the influence of the city: the poet and writer Charles-Ferdinand Ramuz as well as the playwright Jean Anouilh, the musicologist Paul-André Gaillard and mountain composer Émile Blanchet, filmmaker Henri Verneuil, painter Raoul Domenjoz, philosopher Arnold Reymond, General Henri Guisan, winemaker and playwright Edouard Borgeaud, political scientist and historian Pierre du Bois de Dunilac, and many more.

Economy
Pully was a rather rural village until the beginning of the 20th century. At that time viticulture was practiced on the slopes around the town center, but in 1915 it was replaced by vegetable growing. Today there are only a few small vineyards left. The primary sector has hardly any significance in the employment structure of the population.

Due to its location directly on the city limits of Lausanne, the settlement pressure on Pully rose sharply as early as 1900. As a result, the former wine-growing village developed into a residential suburb of Lausanne. The slopes around the old town center were built over with apartment blocks, single-family houses and villas and the agricultural zones were pushed back further and further. In contrast to the other municipalities bordering on Lausanne, there is no major industrial or commercial area in Pully. Tetra Pak International SA and Assura are important companies. The vast majority of those employed in Pully (around 80%) are employed in the service sector.

Pully has a boat harbor on Lake Geneva and a recreation area along the lake. The municipality’s first bathing establishment was opened in 1913.

As of 2010, Pully had an unemployment rate of 4.4%. As of 2008, there were 27 people employed in the primary economic sector and about 9 businesses involved in this sector. 427 people were employed in the secondary sector and there were 71 businesses in this sector. 4,287 people were employed in the tertiary sector, with 565 businesses in this sector. There were 7,822 residents of the municipality who were employed in some capacity, of which females made up 47.2% of the workforce.

In 2008 the total number of full-time equivalent jobs was 3,961. The number of jobs in the primary sector was 21, of which 18 were in agriculture and 3 were in forestry or lumber production. The number of jobs in the secondary sector was 399 of which 56 or (14.0%) were in manufacturing and 322 (80.7%) were in construction. The number of jobs in the tertiary sector was 3,541. In the tertiary sector; 560 or 15.8% were in wholesale or retail sales or the repair of motor vehicles, 46 or 1.3% were in the movement and storage of goods, 160 or 4.5% were in a hotel or restaurant, 154 or 4.3% were in the information industry, 325 or 9.2% were the insurance or financial industry, 936 or 26.4% were technical professionals or scientists, 438 or 12.4% were in education and 432 or 12.2% were in health care.

In 2000, there were 3,551 workers who commuted into the municipality and 6,070 workers who commuted away. The municipality is a net exporter of workers, with about 1.7 workers leaving the municipality for every one entering. About 1.3% of the workforce coming into Pully are coming from outside Switzerland, while 0.1% of the locals commute out of Switzerland for work. Of the working population, 28.7% used public transportation to get to work, and 53.9% used a private car.

Sights
The Gardens of Villa Eupalinos and the Roman villa at Prieuré are listed as Swiss heritage sites of national significance. The entire urban village of Pully is part of the Inventory of Swiss Heritage Sites. The reformed parish church of Saint-Germain has a polygonal choir in the late Gothic style (16th century), the nave was renewed in the 20th century. Next to the church is the priory, the parish hall, also in late Gothic style, restored several times in the 18th and 19th centuries. The Praroman Chapel was built in 1506. In the old town center some winegrowers’ houses from the 18th and 19th centuries have been preserved. The remains of the Roman villa are kept in the museum. The fragments of a wall painting depicting scenes from Roman chariot races are of particular importance. The Musée d’art de Pully, dedicated to contemporary art, does not have any old buildings, but is aesthetically one of the most important sights in the city.

Historical heritage

Roman villa, remains of a semicircular building retaining remains of wall paintings.
Former Saint-Germain church, now Protestant temple (av. Du Prieuré).
Priory of Pully.
Cure (av. Du Prieuré 20), built in 1594 by master masons Daniel Heintz the Elder Anthoni Pauli.
Protestant temple of Chamblandes, 1937, by the architect Jules Fallet.
Neoclassical villa (av. Général-Guisan 71), 1938, by architect Jack Cornaz.

La Rosiaz
La Rosiaz, Protestant temple from 1951-1953, by architect Paul Lavenex.
La Rosiaz, ch. de la Bruyère 17, Villa Eupalinos, 1927, based on drawings by owner Charles Stern (1886-1940), amateur painter, construction under the direction of architect Henri-Robert Von der Mühll.
La Rosiaz, ch. des Ramiers 18, villa in the picturesque cottage style, by architect Georges EpITALS, 1906. Stained glass windows by Pierre Chiara.
Paudèze viaduct.

Culture
The cultural life of Pully is shaped to a significant extent by the L’Octogone cultural center, which opened in 1976, including a theater (Théâtre de Pully). The Théâtre de la Voirie is also well known.

Pully has had a local museum since 1949. In 1991 a museum for contemporary art was added. The “Musée d’art de Pully” was set up and is financially supported by the A. Edelman Foundation in cooperation with the city. Exhibitions such as “Zao Wou-Ki collectionneur” in 2019 will be shown there.

The Roman Villa of the Priory and its murals as well as the gardens of the Villa Eupalinos are listed as cultural property of national importance.

The Pully Art Museum is devoted to the presentation of regional visual art, and offers a collection relating to the work of Charles-Ferdinand Ramuz.

The Octogone, a performance hall created in 1979, is home to the contemporary dance company Lingua.

Festivals
Pully Lavaux Festival in Quebec Time: French songs featuring Quebec artists;
Pully Musical Weekend;
For Noise Festival: rock songs. The last edition took place in August 2016.
Pully Sound Sound Festival.

Parks and green spaces
The first public park known to Pully was the “Campagne Guillemin”, with an area of 14,000 square meters. It is the result of the donation to the town in 1944 from Bella (1875-1952), Cécile (1863-1948) and Hélène Guillemin (1865-1952), respectively widow and sisters of Georges Guillemin (1862-1943), former CFF engineer, who had also expressed his intentions on this subject a few months before his death.

In 1954, the first facilities were made available so that walkers, mothers and their children could benefit from this green corner, namely benches, swings, slide, a grassy square and fine sand. In the fall of 1966, new residents made their appearance with the arrival of two fawns, and the same year a paddling pool was built, which was almost destroyed in 2009, but which was saved from demolition by people who circulated a petition. Regarding the history of the Guillemin countryside, it is possible to go back to the time when the property, which was even larger at the time, was divided into two plots, one called “Crêt de Montelly” and the other the “Field of the poor”, and where the canton of Vaud was administered by Bern and the bailiff Albert Tscharner.

It was in 1763that it was acquired by the Georges-César Verrey family, citizen of Lausanne and bourgeois of Vevey. Samson Reymondin, judge and deputy, then became the owner. In 1851, it was Étienne Guillemin’s turn, Georges’ father, who acquired this property by inheritance from his aunt Sophie Élisabeth, daughter of François-Victor Eternod, widow of Samson Reymondin. In 1944, the property known as “Campagne de Perraudettaz” had an area of 23,351 square meters. There was a mansion with vaulted cellars, a farm building, an old abandoned small factory and a chalet. Under the conditions of the donation, half of the property, to the south of the mansion, was devoted to the creation of a park, which would bear the name of Campagne Guillemin, and the other half, to the north, devoted to housing construction.

The mansion was not to be modified in its dimensions and architecture, and no alcoholic beverages outletshould only be open on the property. The donors also retained, as usufruct, the enjoyment of the whole property until the death of the last survivor. Bella Guillemin née Barbey died in September 1952 and Hélène Guillemin on November 15, 1952. In December 1952, during a municipal meeting, President E. Koch and the syndic Charles Besson announced that the municipality officially took possession of the Campaign of La Perraudettaz. Georges, Cécile, Bella and Hélène Guillemin rest in the cemetery of Pully, in front of the grave of General Henri Guisan.

The new development of the shores of Lake Geneva was inaugurated on May 14, 1976after five years of work. With a surface area of 29,000 m, which goes from the mouth of the Paudèze to the western end of the Amédée Milliquet quay (the quay so named, in tribute to a former trustee and first chairman of the committee of the rescue of Pully in 1921), including the swimming pool, including an Olympic basin, the new landing stage of the Compagnie générale de navigation, the small boat port, the quays, a park and a car park. To make these projects a reality, 150,000 m of land had to be brought in, thus making it possible to gain 42,000 m on the lake. The cost of the works amounted to 16 million Swiss francs. On May 25, 1985, a miniature passenger train was opened to the public with a course of 420 meters of track with a gauge of 184 mm.

The Rochettaz sports center was inaugurated on June 28 and 29, 1980. It hosts the Pully Football, the Tennis-club and the Federal Gymnastics Society. In 1977, Pully Football could nevertheless already play on football fields. In order for this sports center to be created, the Paudèze had to be vaulted over a length of 332 meters between the hamlet of La Rochettaz and the Chemin des Anciens-Moulins, backfilling part of the valley, as well as laying a new pipeline on the surface. of the backfill. This project, which dated from 1964, had three objectives, to create a public dump of construction materials of approximately 320,000 cubic meters, to stabilize somewhat the sides of the Paudèze valley and to create on the reclaimed terraces, of approximately 25,000 square meters, places reserved for walks and sports. It took twelve years to operate the landfill and settle down.

The Vita course, located in Monts-de-Pully, at a place called “En Chenaulaz”, was inaugurated on October 21, 1972.

WALK trail
This walk trail is an opportunity to discover the territory of the City of Pully, from the Paudèze valley to that of Vuachère. Between residential districts, green spaces, wooded lines, panoramas on the lake, alleys of Vieux Pully, this route invites you to stroll, proving that the urban space often offers a beautiful landscape diversity. Over the points of interest, this walk allows you to evoke the history of the place, to present a series of trees encountered along the way, but also to highlight some actions carried out by the City in connection with the public space.