St. Johann Baptist

St. Johann Baptist stands in Memmingen as a former Augustinian monastery church with a long architectural history. The complex began around 1240 through the city council’s foundation of an Augustinian monastery dedicated to John the Baptist and Saint Augustine. A rebuilt choir gained a cross-ribbed vault in 1447, while the nave changed after four altars and a sacrament house appeared. Baroque alterations reshaped the monastery and church during the eighteenth century.

Secularization in 1803 transferred the monastery first to the Teutonic Order and later to Bavaria. The church became a Catholic parish church in 1807, while most monastery buildings disappeared by 1852. Neo-Gothic work replaced the Baroque interior during the early twentieth century, followed by a redesign addressing moisture from the city stream beneath. Wooden sculptures span several periods, including a Christ figure with movable arms from around 1500, probably made in Ivo Strigel’s workshop. A Steinmeyer organ arrived in 1952, and the wheelchair-accessible church later received structural repairs for its unstable coffered ceiling.