Saint Nicholas Haguenau, Gothic church in Haguenau, France

Saint Nicholas is a Gothic church at 204 Grand Rue in Haguenau, with an interior 55 metres long, 16 metres wide and 13 metres high, and a bell tower 59 metres tall. Its walls are of sandstone and brick with quoins; the tower's octagonal level, rebuilt after the war, is concrete covered with slate. The nave is flanked by two aisles with clustered pillars, pointed arches and a ribbed vault, and rows of dark wooden pews line a tiled central aisle.

Emperor Frederick Barbarossa founded a hospital with an oratory around 1164, served by Premonstratensian canons; its Romanesque tower survives. Damaged in 1298 during Strasbourg's siege of Haguenau, the sanctuary was absorbed into the Gothic church begun in 1289. The nave was extended eastward in the 15th century, and the building was restored from 1965 after World War II damage.

The church takes its name from Saint Nicholas, and its two patron saints are Saint Nicholas and Saint Norbert, founder of the Premonstratensian order. Fifteenth-century sandstone statues of both stood in the church; they were beheaded during the French Revolution and given new heads in the 19th century. A late-18th-century painting shows Saint Norbert receiving the scapular from the Virgin and Child.

The building is located in the old town and easily accessible on foot. Visitors should know that opening hours are limited and access may sometimes be restricted, so it is wise to check ahead.

The organ case dates from the 18th century and was built in 1747 by Johann Georg Rohrer for the Cistercian abbey church of Neubourg; it was sold to Haguenau in 1804 and installed in Saint-Nicolas. The case is a listed monument historique, while the instrument inside was rebuilt in 1987 by Alfred Kern.