The Cloisters

The Cloisters is an Italian-style garden feature completed in 1914 by Peto. It is constructed from coursed rubble stone and topped with a shallow stone slate roof. The structure is square and encloses arcaded cloisters, featuring a single-storey, five-bay front. The central doorway is adorned with Italian double iron grilles set in an Italian marble architrave, flanked by round-headed niches that contain statues of a monk and a bishop. Above the doorway is a double round-headed window with central marble columns on either side, and a statue of the Virgin and Child from Treviso, which is topped with a gabled canopy and other fragments of reset carving. The exterior corners are accentuated with cable-moulded shafts.

On the right side, there is a triple round-headed window with marble columns and a balcony with a balustrade, along with a lunette featuring a grille and a bell. The left side and rear of the building have gabled projections that serve as internal 'transepts'. Inside, the cloister arcade consists of coupled marble columns and stilted round arches, with barrel-vaulted roofs in both the cloister and the 'transepts'. A wellhead from Aquilegia is located in the center of the courtyard. The walls and 'transepts' display part of Peto's collection of Italian and Byzantine sculpture, both religious and secular. This unique building was specifically designed to house this remarkable collection.