Abbaye d'Ubexy, Trappistine abbey in Ubexy, France

Abbaye d'Ubexy is a Trappistine abbey founded in 1841 in a former medieval castle, with buildings the nuns constructed themselves. Its long facade has a pale weathered plaster wall, a dark slate roof, four pointed-arch windows with rectangular panes, a square stone buttress, and a tower with a slate spire and cross.

The monastery was founded in 1841 within a medieval castle and gained official recognition as a priory in 1847. Later, Pope Pius IX elevated it to abbey status, cementing its position as a fully independent community.

The nuns here produced communion wafers, those thin discs used in religious services. This work became a central part of life in the monastery and supplied churches throughout France and beyond.

The monastery closed in 2012, when the twelve remaining nuns moved to Igny Abbey, so there is no visiting or retreat programme. The buildings stand in the western part of Ubexy, on the eastern slope of the hill called "haut des angles", about five kilometres south of Charmes. The pale plaster facade with its four pointed-arch windows, buttress and slate-spired tower can be seen from outside.

The host-making workshop became the largest French producer of communion wafers, turning out three to four tonnes a month, or twenty-eight million hosts. The monastery also kept four hundred rabbits and three hundred chickens. Its first daughter house, Tenshien, was founded in Japan in 1898; El Encuentro followed in Mexico in 1971.