You are here:
Abbeys > Belgium > Liège > Amay > Paix-Dieu (La)

Paix-Dieu (La)

The ancient abbey of Cistercian nuns La Paix- Dieu has been founded in 1244 on the bottom of a small valley in the entity called Bodegnée. This abbey is daughter of Aulne's monastery. Thirty-three abbesses have ruled La Paix-Dieu between 1244 and 1797. During august 1797, the site is sold as national property. Buildings still visible today have been constructed during the 17th and 18th centuries. In the west is the square farm which leads to the main courtyard closed by the abbess quartier and the hostellery. The church and the infirmary delimit in the east the ancient cloister vanished in the beginning of the 19th century. North side, the millcourse constructed behind the enclosure wall and behind the fruit and vegetable gardens, fed the monastic mill in hydraulic energy. In 1996, the Walloon Region has contracted a long lease with the owner of the site to set up the training Centre of Heritage crafts, run by the walloon Heritage Institute. Since, the listed monuments have been restored little by little and reassigned to receive different activities: improving trainings for adults, classes of awakening to heritage trade's for children, a information and documentation centre and the co-ordination of a complementary master in preservation and restoration of cultural heritage real estate. Today, in La Paix-Dieu, craftsmen transmit the traditional know-how in all the heritage building's fields (carpentry, stones and bricks masonry, lime work) in an interactive mode with theoricians who are specialized in those fields.