Saint Catherine of Alexandria Church (Sankt Katharein an der Laming)

The parish church of St Katharein an der Laming stands in the village of the same name in Tragöß-Sankt Katharein, a municipality set in the green hills of the Bruck-Mürzzuschlag district. First mentioned in 1255, it became a parish church in 1376. The present late-Gothic building dates from the early sixteenth century, with a single major restoration in 1968. Its exterior shows stepped buttresses on the choir and a diagonal buttress at the south-east corner of the nave. The pointed south door is richly moulded, and the church has two- and three-light traceried windows. A half-engaged octagonal stair turret stands at the north-west corner, while the three-storey west tower carries a Baroque onion dome renewed in 1931. Inside, the three-bay nave is covered by star-ribbed vaults, as is the two-bay choir which ends in a three-sided apse. The west gallery, with its sweeping Baroque railing from the eighteenth century, rests on octagonal piers. The high altar, made around 1700, holds a painting by Leonhard Fez dated 1655. A bell cast by Florentin Streckfuß in 1707 hangs in the tower’s rib-vaulted bell chamber.