[2] The Hofwil Institution building was constructed between 1817 and 1821 as a centerpiece of Emanuel von Fellenberg's educational vision.
A 1857 article in The Massachusetts Teacher and Journal of Home and School Education wrote that the system "proved that pupils, who enter such an institution at ten years of age, and remain there ten years, can, by their labor alone, defray their expenses for board, clothing, and instruction, besides having learned a useful occupation".
[6] Often, these schools were established to train children from poor families to be productive members of society.
[7][8] In Australia, in the 1840s, James Bonwick named his boarding school Hofwyl House and was called "the de Fellenberg of Tasmania.
The Canton of Bern bought the building in 1884 to house the expansion of the teachers' college, which had been founded in 1833 in Münchenbuchsee.