Cheshire · England

Combermere Abbey

Photo: Combermere Abbey by The original uploader was Espresso Addict at English Wikipedia., CC BY-SA 2.5, via Wikimedia Commons

About this place

Hugh Malbank, Baron of Nantwich, founded Combermere Abbey in the 1130s as a monastery on the Cheshire-Shropshire border.

After the Dissolution the buildings were converted into a country house, and the estate near Nantwich is now run as a wedding venue with self-catering cottages and accommodation in the North Wing.

The park contains Comber Mere, a large lake that is a Site of Special Scientific Interest.

Visitors can book abbey tours or stay overnight in one of the estate's cottages.

Read more on Wikipedia

History

The community, initially Savigniac and then Cistercian, had become the third largest monastic house in Cheshire by income before its dissolution in 1538. Sir George Cotton acquired the site afterwards, pulled down the church and most of the monastic buildings, and turned part of the remainder into a house, which his son Richard remodelled in 1563. Stapleton Cotton, Viscount Combermere, gave the house its Gothic appearance between 1814 and 1821, and the Cotton family held the estate until 1919.

Architecture

The house is listed grade I and carries fabric from its monastic origins within a building reworked across four centuries, most visibly in the early nineteenth-century Gothic remodelling commissioned by Viscount Combermere.

Gardens & grounds

The estate includes Victorian walled gardens and an Edwardian glasshouse, along with woodland walks through the wider parkland.

Plan your visit

Nearest station: Wrenbury Rail Station (2 miles)

Nearby properties