Stift Engelszell

Trappist monastery, the only one in Austria. It is located near Engelhartszell an der Donau in Upper Austria. The abbey was founded in 1293 by Bernhard Prambach, bishop of Passau, as a Cistercian monastery. Between 1754 and 1764 the abbey church was built, an impressive Rococo structure with a 76-meter tower.

In 1786 the abbey was disbanded by Emperor Joseph II and its buildings were used for secular purposes, including factories and residences. The monastery buildings were reoccupied in 1925 by German Trappist monks expelled after World War I from the French abbey of Aulonberg in Alsace. After the war, in 1945, only about a third of the monks returned to the monastery.

The abbey had been brewing its own beer since 1590, but production ceased in 1929. In November 2011 the construction of a new brewery began. It is installed in the monastery's existing outbuildings and has the capacity to produce up to 2,500 hectoliters per year.

On February 8, 2012 the new brewery in the Austrian abbey brews the first Trappist beer since the abbey's closure in 1929. In May 2012 the International Trappist Association approved Engelszell as the 8th producer of Trappist beers in the world and the 2nd producer outside Belgium.