Calwich Abbey
Tucked into the Staffordshire countryside, Calwich Abbey began life as a medieval priory. Centuries later the land passed from the Fleetwood family to Bernard Granville, who had big ideas. He cleared away the old priory house, built himself a new residence closer to the stream, and even reshaped the water into a small lake for good measure.
Granville died without children in 1775, so the estate went to his nephew, the Reverend John D’Ewes, who took the Granville name when he inherited. Another nephew, Court D’Ewes, later did the same when the property came his way in 1826. In its Georgian heyday the house welcomed an impressive guest list—Erasmus Darwin, Handel, writer Anna Seward, and the philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau are all said to have visited.
A new chapter opened in the 1840s when the Duncombe family bought the estate. They commissioned architect William Burn to rebuild on higher ground in a confident Jacobean revival style. Think dressed ashlar stone, slate roofs, two storeys, and a pleasantly irregular plan that feels evolved rather than imposed.
Time, however, was not kind. Much of the house was demolished in 1927. What remains—together with the stables—is Grade II listed but sadly derelict, its weathered masonry now shared with ivy and long grass. Down by the water, a small fishing temple still survives, a quiet witness to everything Calwich Abbey has been.
Photographs were taken on the Mamiya C220 using CineStill 400D and the VHS was shot on the JVC GR-C1. Shot in Shropshire May 2025. The rather out of focus Super8 is from a Canon – more practice needed for sure!
These haunting medium format photographs document the decaying remnants of Calwich Abbey, once a grand Jacobean-style estate rich in intellectual, musical, and philosophical heritage. Now overrun by wildflowers, ivy, and silence, the abbey exists in a state of poetic ruin.
Shot on medium format film, the series captures the textured elegance of nature reclaiming architecture. The images reflect the quiet drama of the site—ivy curling into broken windows, sunlight catching on slate roofs, and caravans sitting in the long grass beneath rusting agricultural shelters.
Every frame is an invitation to consider the passage of time: the grandeur that once drew Handel and Rousseau, now softened into memory and moss.
