Mariä Himmelfahrt

Mariä Himmelfahrt is a modern Catholic parish church in eastern Memmingen, shaped by the city’s post-war growth. Its 58.5-metre tower rises above Augsburger Straße with an inverted Latin cross, known as a Petrine cross. The square interior follows architect Thomas Wechs’s sector design, with two reinforced-concrete arches spanning up to 42.5 metres. Copper doors by Augsburg artist Georg Bernhard introduce the building’s strong connection between architecture and craftsmanship.

Construction began in 1954, after more than 7,000 war refugees and 1,000 Baltic emigrants settled nearby. The church was consecrated in 1956 and renovated in 1974, when plastered walls and a new lectern reshaped the interior. A 2004 Rieger organ now provides 45 stops across three manuals and pedal, while natural-stone mosaics show eight saints on the side altars. Behind the central altar, a brass-gilded tabernacle by Therese Hössle-Seidel depicts the Last Supper.

The Marian chapel forms an enclosed prayer space on the northern side of the choir. Six stained-glass scenes trace the life of the Virgin Mary, while a baptismal font carries a hovering dove symbolising the Holy Spirit. A twelve-candle chandelier hangs above the altar, evoking Jerusalem with its twelve towers. In the tower’s ground floor, Andreas Bindl’s Pietà serves as a war memorial, giving the church’s post-war history a quiet, visible presence.