Malchow Abbey, Cistercian monastery in Malchow, Germany.
Malchow Abbey stands on the east shore of Lake Malchow, opposite the island town of Malchow. Its church, built 1844–1849 to plans by Friedrich Wilhelm Buttel, has a 52-metre brick tower and a nave rebuilt in Gothic Revival style after an 1888 fire. Parts of the cloister and convent buildings survive, along with the Engelscher Garten.
The monastery was founded in 1298 after being relocated from Röbel to Malchow, where it received support from Nicholas II, Prince of Werle. After the Reformation in the 1500s, the abbey's role in the region changed significantly.
The abbey church, now a concert hall and organ museum, displays an organ by Friedrich Friese III. The Mecklenburg Organ Museum, the first of its kind in the new federal states, documents Mecklenburg organ building in the church and the nearby former parish house. The Engelsche Garten, named after kitchen master Johann Jacob Christian Engel, was laid out from 1786 and finished in 1855/56.
The Mecklenburg Organ Museum occupies the abbey church and the nearby organ courtyard, with a permanent exhibition on Mecklenburg organ building and an organ by Friedrich Friese III in the church itself. The complex stands on the east shore of Lake Malchow, opposite the island town of Malchow. Parts of the cloister and some ancillary buildings survive, and the Engelsche Garten, laid out from 1786, lies within the grounds.
Following the Reformation in 1572, the abbey became a Protestant residence for unmarried noblewomen and kept this purpose until 1923. This unexpected change makes it a rare example of a monastic complex that served two entirely different functions across centuries.
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