Colegio de la Compañía

The Colegio de la Compañía, also known today as the Sarmiento Building, is an 18th-century Baroque structure in Pontevedra, Spain, that serves as one of the principal seats of the Pontevedra Museum. Founded by the Jesuits in 1695, this former secondary educational institution occupies a central position on Sarmiento Street in the heart of Pontevedra's old town. The building matters as a rare surviving example of international Baroque architecture adapted to Galician traditions, and as a cultural anchor that has housed educational, social, and museum functions across more than three centuries.

Construction began in 1695 and concluded in 1714, adjacent to the Jesuits' church, now Saint Bartholomew's Church. The project was sponsored by the priest Jorge de Andrade and the municipality of Pontevedra, which sought to consolidate the city's scattered studies into a single establishment. These studies had been supervised by a foundation created in 1644, whose board included noble families such as the Guimarey, Mosquera, Villar, and Pimentel families, along with the Marquis of Aranda. In 1683 the city council had ceded the land for the Jesuit convent and school. The college counted among its students Father Isla and Fray Martín Sarmiento, the latter of whom gave his name to the building. In 1767 Charles III decreed the expulsion of the Jesuits from Spain, after which the complex served various functions: the School of First Letters and Latinity, a cloth factory operated by the English Lees brothers from 1793 to 1826, and from 1845 the first seat of the Provincial High School of Pontevedra, inaugurated on 19 November 1845, where Valle-Inclán studied. It also housed the Normal School of Teachers and, from 1860, the first teacher training college for women in Galicia. From 1903 to 1974 it served as the Hospice and Orphanage of the province, known from 1955 as the Hogar Provincial. In 1978 the Spanish Ministry of the Interior ceded the building to the Pontevedra Museum. Renovation began in 1979; a Goya engraving exhibition opened in the cloister in September 1981, but the definitive inauguration occurred on 11 August 1984. A further remodelling by architects Eduardo Pesquera and Jesús Ulargui was completed with a reopening on 21 August 2013.

As a seat of the Pontevedra Museum, the Sarmiento Building presents archaeological and artistic collections distributed across its floors. The holdings span from Roman antiquity through the Early Middle Ages and Romanesque period, with particular strength in medieval sculpture. The second floor is dedicated to ceramic collections. The basement houses the archaeological section, which includes Roman milestones discovered near the Burgo Bridge. The arrangement allows visitors to move chronologically through regional history while experiencing the architectural setting itself as a historic artifact.

Among the most significant pieces displayed are the tympanum of Palmou and two prophets from the Pórtico de la Gloria of Santiago de Compostela Cathedral, both Romanesque works of exceptional importance. The Roman milestones from the Burgo Bridge area represent key epigraphic evidence of the region's Roman infrastructure. The Goya engraving exhibition held in September 1981 in the cloister, though temporary, marked a notable cultural moment for the institution before its full museum opening.

The former college and residence follows a rectangular plan. Its exterior presents a long, sober Baroque granite façade with numerous symmetrical windows; a later addition extends toward Cobián Roffignac Street. The building comprises a ground floor and first floor, with a remarkable lintelled door at the corner next to the church, decorated with plaques and pilasters and surmounted by a large carved stone coat of arms of Spain on a medallion. Inside, a sumptuous stone staircase designed by Mateo López in 1722 ascends from the ground floor entrance to the upper levels. The two-storey cloister features double arches, four arches per side, and Doric pilasters, comparable to the cloister of the Jesuit church at Villafranca del Bierzo in León province. The basement contains large arcades. The 2010 remodelling by Pesquera and Ulargui glazed the interior cloister and enhanced the basement and its arcades.

The Sarmiento Building stands on Sarmiento Street in the historic centre of Pontevedra, Spain. It is owned by the Pontevedra Museum and functions as one of that institution's primary exhibition venues. The building is accessible to the public as part of the museum's programme, with the archaeological collections on the first floor, ceramics on the second floor, and the basement archaeological section including the restaurant Ultramar. The site's present role is thus dual: it preserves its Baroque architectural heritage while serving as an functioning museum space for the display and interpretation of Galician history and art.