St Hugh's Charterhouse, Parkminster, is the only post-Reformation Carthusian monastery in the United Kingdom. It is located in the parish of Cowfold, West Sussex, England. It is a Grade II* listed building.
History The monastery was founded in 1873, when the property formerly known as Picknoll was acquired for its construction in order to accommodate two houses of French Carthusians in exile. Building took place between 1876 and 1883 to designs by a French architect, Clovis Normand, who had at his disposal a generous budget. The number of monks has varied: 30 in 1883, 70 in 1928, 22 in 1984 and 26 in January 2017.
The buildings are in a French Gothic Revival style although Pevsner's judgement was that 'the plan is magnificent and can only be properly seen from the air'. The church has an unusually tall spire. It stands in the centre of buildings including a library with a collection of rare books and manuscripts and a chapter house decorated with images of the martyrdom of the monks' predecessors. The charterhouse has relics of Ss. Hugh of Lincoln, Boniface, Roseline of Villeneuve, and numerous smaller relics.
The Great Cloister, about long, one of the longest in the world, connects the 34 hermitages to the church and the other buildings, embracing four acres of orchards and the monastic burial ground.Christopher Martin, A Glimpse of Heaven: Catholic churches of England and Wales, English Heritage, Swindon, 2006, pp 159-160 The total length of the cloisters is 1,012 m.
500 solar panels were installed in 2024, which are intended to save over 2,300 tonnes of carbon dioxide over a period of 20 years.The Catholic Post, April 2024, p. 5
See also List of Carthusian monasteries List of monasteries dissolved by Henry VIII of England List of monastic houses in England List of places of worship in Horsham District
References
Further reading Robin Bruce Lockhart, Half-way to Heaven: The Hidden Life of the Sublime Carthusians (London: Thames Methuen, 1985) Nancy Klein Maguire, An Infinity of Little Hours: Five Young Men and Their Trial of Faith in the Western World's Most Austere Monastic Order (roman à clef, = novel based on real-life stories) (New York: PublicAffairs Books 2006, a division of Perseus Publishing, ISBN hardback , paperback 978-1-58648-432-3)
External sources