The Säve Church was erected in the early 13th century. It was first known as St. Olaf Church, after the saintly king Olaf II of Norway. The nave has a barrel vault, built in 1696. In 1704, the ceiling was covered with paintings by German artist Christian von Schönfeldt. In 1729, a cupola was built over the choir, painted by Johan Ross. The paintings depict scenes from both the New and the Old Testament. The porch was built in 1746, and the wooden tower above it was erected in 1750. The choir got its stained glass window in 1902. In 1945, the brick roof of the nave was replaced with slate.
References:The Pilgrimage Church of Wies (Wieskirche) is an oval rococo church, designed in the late 1740s by Dominikus Zimmermann. It is located in the foothills of the Alps in the municipality of Steingaden.
The sanctuary of Wies is a pilgrimage church extraordinarily well-preserved in the beautiful setting of an Alpine valley, and is a perfect masterpiece of Rococo art and creative genius, as well as an exceptional testimony to a civilization that has disappeared.
The hamlet of Wies, in 1738, is said to have been the setting of a miracle in which tears were seen on a simple wooden figure of Christ mounted on a column that was no longer venerated by the Premonstratensian monks of the Abbey. A wooden chapel constructed in the fields housed the miraculous statue for some time. However, pilgrims from Germany, Austria, Bohemia, and even Italy became so numerous that the Abbot of the Premonstratensians of Steingaden decided to construct a splendid sanctuary.