Brauweiler Abbey, Benedictine monastery in Pulheim, Germany

Brauweiler Abbey is a former Benedictine monastery in Pulheim, northwest of Cologne. Its Romanesque church of St. Nicholas and St. Medardus, built between 1136 and 1220, has a tall west tower flanked by two narrow towers. The baroque courtyard wings, begun in 1780, have a red and pink facade with white pilasters, a clock pediment and a slate roof with dormer windows.

The abbey was founded in 1024 by Palatine Count Ezzo and Mathilda of Germany and served the Ezzonian nobility as a burial place. In the 20th century, the complex was used by the Gestapo as a prison between 1933 and 1945 before later transitioning to cultural purposes.

Since 1985 the abbey has housed the cultural departments of the Rhineland Regional Council, the Rhineland Archive and Museum Office with its restoration workshops, and the Rhineland publishing company. Concerts, fine arts exhibitions, symposiums and theatre performances take place on the grounds. The church, now the parish church of St. Nicholas and St. Medardus, keeps its two organs: the west organ with a gilded baroque case of the late 17th century, reinaugurated in 2013, and a choir organ consecrated in 2018.

The complex lies in Brauweiler, part of Pulheim northwest of Cologne, and is now the seat of the Rhineland Regional Council's cultural departments and the Rhineland Archive and Museum Office. The abbey church serves as the parish church of St. Nicholas and St. Medardus. The grounds host concerts, exhibitions, symposiums and theatre performances; check the programme before visiting.

From 1933 to 1945 the Gestapo and Nazi civil authorities used the abbey buildings for the internment, torture and murder of political and social "undesirables"; Konrad Adenauer, former mayor of Cologne and later first Chancellor of the Federal Republic, was among the prisoners. From 1945 to 1949 the site became an open camp for displaced persons, run first by the British Army and then by UNRRA.