Pfarrkirche St. Jakob im Lesachtal

The parish church of St Jakob im Lesachtal stands in the village of Sankt Jakob, surrounded by a quiet cemetery in the Lesach valley. Built in the late Gothic style at the start of the 16th century, it was raised to parish rank in 1688 after earlier medieval mentions. The church and its graveyard are protected monuments, showing layers of care from the 1968 interior restoration to the 1986 exterior work. Inside, the four-bay nave rises under a net-ribbed vault whose ribs form a star in the west and carry painted rosettes, quatrefoils and diamond shapes. A late Baroque music gallery with a sweeping front projects from the west wall, built at the end of the 18th century. The tower on the north side has a sturdy base with slit windows, paired pointed bell-openings with tracery bosses and rosettes, and corner pilasters added around 1800. The lower, single-bay choir ends in a five-sided apse with matching net ribs and painted keystones. A late Gothic sacrament niche with a pointed gable sits in the north wall, and three pointed windows in the apse retain stained glass of Saints Peter and Paul from 1901. A painted sundial and a fragmentary Christopher fresco adorn the south wall of the nave, while the high altar holds late Gothic statues of Saints James, Andrew and Philip from the early 1500s.