Located ca. 50 km north-east of Poznań, Wągrowiec is a county town situated on the Wełna river.
The cloister’s history is traceable back to Łekno, a locality situated ca. 10 km north-east of Wągrowiec. It was there that Zbylut of Pałuka family founded a Cistercian convent in 1153. The monks arrived therein from Altenberg near Cologne. The Łekno convent was probably the earliest Cistercian abbey located (founded) in Polish lands. Late in the 14th century, the convent started being moved to Wągrowiec.
Construction of a gothic cloister church (or just of its presbytery) was completed ca. 1455. The cloister building was constructed over a longer period, and completed only in 1512. In 1681/1682, the church has assumed baroque forms, with Jerzy Catenazzi acting as the redevelopment designer.
In 1796, the monastic estate was taken over by the state. The convent was closed down in 1835. A court of law and a prison were installed in some of the former cloister buildings. The former cloister church was turned into a parish church. In January 1945, the church and the convent buildings were incinerated by the fleeing Germans. The rebuilding process continued afterwards till 1968.
The late-baroque church of the Assumption of Our Lady and St.St. Peter and Paul is a three-nave hall-like edifice erected on a rectangular plan. Its façade is adorned with two low turrets. The interior is covered by sail vaults. The temple’s historic furnishings were destroyed by a 1945 fire, with a main late-baroque main altar surviving, partly reconstructed after 1949. The church has also become home to late-baroque (18th-c.) carved stalls, formerly equipping the Gniezno cathedral.
Adjacent to the church at the south is a three-wing cloister building surrounding a garth, with a 25m-deep well. The cloister complex is surrounded with a wall in which there is a late-baroque tripartite gate.
Address:
ul. Klasztorna 21
62-100 Wągrowiec
