History

The Abbey of Mettlach was founded in the late seventh or early eighth century. The Alte Turm — the octagonal Carolingian chapel that still stands on the grounds — dates from 994 AD, a remnant of the tenth-century Benedictine reform building programme. The abbey was dissolved during the French Revolutionary period and its properties confiscated. In 1809, Jean-François Boch purchased the secularised abbey buildings and established a faïence (tin-glazed earthenware) factory within them — an act that began the company’s Mettlach chapter. The Villeroy & Boch merger followed in 1836, when the Boch family combined operations with Nicolas Villeroy’s Vaudrevange factory, creating the group that would become one of Europe’s dominant ceramic producers. Throughout the nineteenth century, Mettlach developed a speciality in Mosaic and stoneware products, including the Mettlacher Platte (Mettlach tiles) that covered the floors of major public buildings across Germany and beyond. In the twentieth century the company expanded into bathroom fixtures and tableware; today the Mettlach headquarters continues to produce tiles and serves as the group’s symbolic and administrative centre.