WOODEN CHURCH OF ST. NIKOLAS
Wooden Church of St. Nikolas with the bell tower was built in 1910-1911 according to the design by the famous Galician architect and public figure Vasyl Nahirny. In its cruciform construction with a monumental bath, the architect embodied his vision of a new - national - image of the Ukrainian church, based on the heritage of the sacred culture of Byzantium and the folk wooden construction of Galicia.
In general, V. Nagirny designed more than 200 churches in Galicia (in fact, every fourth church) on the edge of the 19th and 20th centuries. He was also the founder of the first Ukrainian cooperative Narodna Torhivlya (People's Trade), the insurance company Dniester, as well as the first chairman of the patriotic sports society Falcon.
The construction of the church was supervised by master Mykola Kasperovych from the town of Mykolayiv on the Dniester. The interior decoration was completed in 1914. Liturgical items from the old wooden church of the early 17th century, which was dismantled in 1913, were partially transferred to the newly built church. Before the emergence of the society Prosvita (Enlightenment) the church played the role of book collection space, archives and news source for the village of Urich; a parish school operated here at the end of the 19th century.
In 1962, the Soviet authorities closed the church. The peasants were forced to hide the keys to the temple and its relics and secretly gathered for prayer. The church was officially reopened at the request of the Greek Catholic community on June 24, 1989. At the same time, wall paintings were made in the interiors (initially the walls of the church were not painted).
In 2011, the Tustan State Historical and Cultural Reserve initiated the restoration of the facades, which were partly wainscoted with sheet metal and partly painted with oil. With the assistance of the Reserve, the community of Urich is gradually returning the temple its original appearance. In 2013, the church housed the icon of the Intercession of Tustan, consecrated during the festival Tu Stan!
To the east of the church is the cemetery of the 19th - early 20th centuries. The church has the status of an architectural monument of local significance (protection number 2378-M).