The canonization of Saint Bridget in 1391 and the translation of her remains to the Abbey Church in 1394 added greatly to the fame and riches of her community.

[1] In 1400 Duke Eric of Pomerania was invested at Vadstena by his great-aunt, Queen Margaret, as King of Denmark, Norway and Sweden.

The abbey was greatly favored by the royal house and nobility and became the spiritual center of the country as well as the greatest landowner in Sweden.

Early on, Vadstena Abbey supported Beghards and Beguines, the latter often aristocratic women, who had a poor reputation among Church authorities.

In 1419, the abbey was subjected to an investigation wherein the abbess, as well as the nuns, were accused of having accepted personal gifts and having entertained male guests at unacceptable hours.

[2] Vadstena Abbey also had international fame as the motherhouse of all the monasteries of the Bridgettine Order, such as Reval, Nådendal, Bergen and Danzig.

In 1406, for example, an English delegation headed by Henry FitzHugh, 3rd Baron FitzHugh arrived asking for members in order to establish a Bridgettine monastery in England, and in 1415 four nuns, three female novices, one monk and one priest left the abbey under great celebrations for the foundation of what became the famed Syon Abbey.

Vadstena Abbey, however, was exempted from this ban and allowed to accept novices even after the Reformation, though only by special permission from the monarch.

This regulation was directed to Bishop Hans Brask by King Gustav Vasa in 1527 after an elopement by a novice the previous year.

In large part, this may be due to the fact that the monks, after having converted to Lutheranism, were provided with the professions of medical doctor, pastor or teacher, while the nuns seldom had a choice other than marriage.

The Catholic Mass and the veneration of saints were banned and Protestant services were ordered to be held in the Abbey church.

The abbey was allowed to receive private donations on condition that the monks refrain from the public Catholic sermons they had evidently been preaching until then.

During the reign of King John III (1569–1592), the abbey was restored and enriched, and the abbess was on very good terms with the royal couple.

In 1641, a Krigsmanshus (home for veterans) was founded for retired and invalid soldiers and their families, and was housed in the former nuns' wing for over 140 years.

The northern building, which contains the nuns' chapterhouse and dormitory, was going to be converted into other uses when in 1956 it was discovered to contain substantial remains of a thirteenth-century royal palace.

In 1935, the religious sisters of the Birgittine Order came to Vadstena under the Saint Elisabeth Hasselblad and established a convent outside of the grounds of the former abbey.

The present-day monastery of Bridgettine nuns, situated near the ancient abbey, is named Mary's Peace (Latin: Pax Mariae).