Kapuzinerkloster Gauenstein

The Capuchin monastery of Gauenstein stands on a high rock above the village of Schruns in the Gaueserwald forest. The site has been a place of quiet retreat since the early 18th century, when an hermitage first appeared on the cliff. The present buildings date from 1844, when Capuchins took over the site and turned it into a monastery that remained in use until 2021.

The monastery church, dedicated to Our Lady of Sorrows, was completed in 1851 after earlier chapels had stood on the rock since 1709. The church’s interior shows the work of several artists: a painting of the Sorrowful Mother by Johann Paul Scheiber, a Pietà by Albert Winkler, and the 1849 side-altar by Josef Anton Bertle. The bell in the tower was cast in 1751, and the whole ensemble is protected as a listed monument.

Visitors walk up to the rock through the walled garden planted by the nuns who now care for the site. The church’s low choir and simple rectangular nave give a sense of calm, while the surrounding forest offers quiet paths beneath the cliffs. The monastery buildings themselves, enlarged in 1929 as a guest house, sit beside an old machinery house that once served a cable railway down to the valley.