Val Saint-Lambert

Val Saint-Lambert was a Cistercian abbey founded in 1202 and suppressed in the French period, and in 1826 the buildings were bought and turned into a crystal works, which grew into one of the largest in the world and supplied European courts through the nineteenth century, employing several thousand people at its height. Production has shrunk drastically but continues on a small scale, and the site now combines a museum of the crystal, a display of historic pieces, the abbey buildings including the eighteenth-century chateau, and a workshop where blowers and cutters can be watched at work. The industrial buildings around it are largely derelict, which gives the site a mixed character of craft demonstration and post-industrial decay.

What you actually see

• Glassblowing and cutting at work - the surviving small-scale production.
• Historic crystal collections - pieces made for European courts.
• The abbey buildings - the Cistercian site the works was built into.
• The eighteenth-century chateau - the abbot's residence on the site.

When to go

Year round; it is indoors. Two to three hours. Demonstrations run at set times on working days and there are none at weekends in some seasons, so check first. Closed some Mondays.

Honest expectations

Production is a shadow of what it was and much of the site is derelict. Demonstrations depend on the workshop schedule and are not always running. The shop is the main commercial focus. Interpretation is in French.

Nearby

Liege is north-east along the Meuse; Blegny-Mine lies north.