Following on from our visit to Moreton Corbet Castle last month, Mum and I drove the short distance to another English Heritage property, Haughmond Abbey.
Haughmond Abbey stands on the side of a hill, 3 miles to the North East of the Shropshire town of Shrewsbury. It is free to enter for English Heritage members or just £4 for adults without membership. Unfortunately, Haughmond Abbey is closed over the autumn/winter period (from 1st October 2016 to 31st March 2017), so if you wish to visit this year, you’ll need to be quick!
Access is down a short (and somewhat bumpy) lane (not the best for turning out of when leaving) and there is a small car park for up to 15 cars.
When we arrived at lunch time, we were the only visitors there, so we had the abbey to ourselves for a while (handy for taking photos!).
As you can see, Haughmond Abbey is in ruins, but enough of it still stands to give you a good idea of what it must have been like back in its heydey. The guide book (which can be purchased from the kiosk) gives you a map and tour around the site, but we made our own way around… First exploring the outside of the ruins, before exploring the inside.
Haughmond Abbey was formally founded in 1135, but a small religious community was first established there around the end of the 11th century. As part of Henry VIII’s Dissolution of the Monasteries, the abbey was dissolved in 1539 and the abbot’s hall and adjoining rooms were converted into a private residence. After a fire during the Civil War (the mid-1600’s), the abbey was no longer used as a higher status residence. Instead, it was used as a farm until the early 1900’s.
It’s amazing so much of the remains still survive, especially as partial demolition and removal and reuse of stone from some of the buildings had taken place.
A kiosk selling souvenirs and gifts, as well as hot/cold drinks and snacks, stands at the entrance. There is a picnic area (with picnic tables and benches) and two port-a-loos (including a disabled one) on-site.
After leaving Haughmond Abbey, we made our way to Wroxeter Roman City (in a roundabout way), but more about that another day.
Ahhh… I can just lose myself in posts like these! I have a deck of Heritage playing cards featuring Abbeys and this one is on the 9 of diamonds.
Love getting to see so much more of it in your beautiful photos.
Hi Nikki,
You captured some very dramatic and stunning pictures, I particularly like the one of the Abbot’s Private Rooms.
I am always amazed by the way in which great swathes of a building can be destroyed or suffer from age decay, when there are other areas whuch escape almost relatively unscathed. 🙂
The sky here in Somerset looked very much like that all morning today, then about lunchtime the heavens opened and that was it for the rest of the day!
I am hoping for a slightly drier day tomorrow, as we are out and about trail writing in Taunton.
We debated long and hard about signing up for membership of EH or HHA, but finally decided to stick with the NT for now.
I completely agree with many of the volunteers I work with, that if you have memebership of all three organisations, you will never be too far from somewhere to visit. However, that’s maybe a strategy for a bit further down the line.
Nice post and it looks as though you had a lovely interesting day out 🙂
Yvonne
Fabulous and mysterious!
This is beautiful! I love Abbeys. Kirkstall Abbey is my fav 🙂
Corinne x
Another place for a great day out. We’re so lucky to have such wonderful places to visit, steeped in history.
Thank you for sharing another wonderful place to visit. Although these are magnificent ruins it is rather sad to think of what they once must have been like!
How wonderful. Given that visits to such places are difficult for me I do so enjoy these posts. Thank you.
This is beautiful! There is this mysterious or magical aura in that place. Looking at the photos closely somehow transported me back in time.