Warden Abbey

Warden Abbey is a small fragment of a house built around 1560 for Robert Gostwick. It stands on the site of a Cistercian abbey founded in 1135 by Walter Espec, with the church being rebuilt in the late 14th century. The abbey was dissolved in 1537. The 16th-century house includes a buttress from the abbey church and is constructed of red brick with some ashlar dressings. Most window surrounds and mullions are made of brick, though some have been later rendered to imitate ashlar.

The building has two bays, two storeys, and attics. On the south elevation, the projecting left block features two ground floor windows, each with three 3-centred arched lights under square heads, set within 3-centred arched recesses of varying sizes. The first floor has a canted bay window with seven 3-centred arched lights and a moulded cornice. To the right of this is an integral chimney stack with crow-steps, a twisted shaft, and a spurred cap, all made of moulded brick. The recessed right bay has a four-centred arched door within a crocketed ogee-headed stone surround topped with a finial. Above, there is a square-headed window with two 3-centred arched lights and a moulded label. A two-stage buttress is located to the right, and there is a brick string course on the first floor, topped with an embattled parapet and stone coping.

On the north elevation, the first floor features a two-light window similar to that on the south elevation. There is a semi-octagonal stair turret (with the top stage rebuilt in the 20th century) that has pairs of 3-centred arched lights, and a two-stage buttress to the left. The west elevation has a projecting chimney breast with a substantial ashlar lower stage.

Inside, the ground and first floor rooms retain finely moulded beams and original fireplaces. The first floor room includes a Tudor arched doorway with carved foliate spandrels, and there is a three-bay clasped purlin roof with curved wind braces. The site is also recognized as a Scheduled Ancient Monument.