Ceremony of opening the Centre of Building Heritage in Plasy
On 29 September 2015, the National Technical Museum is opening in the newly renovated historically valuable outbuildings in the premises of the monastery in Plasy the Centre of Building Heritage, a unique centre of documentation, presentation and lifelong learning in the fields related to building history and traditional construction engineering.
The second stage of reconstruction of one of the most significant monasteries in the Central Europe was carried out by HOCHTIEF CZ. Since the 12th century the monastery has undergone notable changes. It developed prominently in the 17th and 18th century when it was daringly rebuilt to a design of the architects Jean Baptiste Mathey and Jan Blažej Santini. After 1826, when the property of the closed down monastery was bought by an Austrian politician Klemens Wenzel von Metternich, further construction works followed including changes connected with agricultural plans of the Metternich family. After World War II, the buildings were confiscated and used for various purposes. In 1995 the former monastery was put on the national heritage list and renovation of its exceptionally valuable buildings started.
The National Technical Museum took over the former monastery´s outbuildings to manage them in 2008, but these were rather dilapidated. Within a project co-financed from the European Fund for Regional Development the agricultural premises were reconstructed – in the first stage from 2012 buildings of the former brewery, malt house and mill and in the second stage from 2014 renovation of the agricultural yard. The total project cost exceeds CZK 350 million.