Sancta Maria Abbey, Nunraw, Haddington, Haddington and Lammermuir, East Lothian

Description

Designed in 1952 by architect Peter Whiston, Sancta Maria Abbey is a large monastery complex built for the Cistercian order over an extended period from 1952 to 1969 with the help of some of the resident monks. The site consists of a large cloister range (incorporating a chapel), linking refectory and workshop wings and a separate garage and workshop block to the southeast.

In accordance with Section 1 (4A) of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) (Scotland) Act 1997 the following are excluded from the listing: two huts to the southeast.

The cloister comprises a two storey, U-plan pitched roof range of buildings, with an integral single storey flat roofed block forming an enclosed quadrant cloister garth.

The southwest range extends slightly outwards from the square plan at its gable ends and houses the library. The northeast side of the cloister is formed by a flat roofed section which was originally planned for a two storey church that was never built. The northwest range houses the chapel, known as the 'temporary church'. The cloister windows have shallow pointed arches and the windows on the external elevations are rectangular and vary in size with large multi-pane glazed sections to the library, over the main staircase in the west elevation and also the stair at the south corner. There are three cantilevered concrete balconies with metal railings on the external elevation to the southeast.

There is a two-storey pitched roofed refectory wing with a prominent chimney with an angled stack and tablet style cowl. There are lowered eaves extending from the south corner of the cloister.

There is a flat roofed single-storey wing linked to the southeast corner of the refectory which houses the laundry and workshops.

There is also a rectangular-plan flat-roofed garage and workshop block to the southeast which dates to the mid-1960s. It is mostly rendered with large glazed window sections and walls part clad in stone to each end.

The stone is from the local Rattlebags quarry and is laid as squared, split face rubble. The window margins, cills and lintels on the refectory block, which was built first, are also cut from Rattlebags stone. Elsewhere the details have been altered to incorporate roughly faced precast concrete lintels and precast margins and cills. The concrete uses Rattlebags stone aggregate and mimics the appearance of the wall faces. The doors are timber and glazed replacements (changed around 2016) and are similar to the doors dating to the time of construction. The roofs are slated with plain stone skews.

The interior of the abbey was seen in 2016 and is simply detailed and largely contemporary with the mid-20th century date of construction. The white cloister corridors have polished slab granolithic stone flooring and recessed pointed arch details that copy the style of the windows and carved timber Stations of the Cross. The main rooms such as the small café, the library and the chapel all have timber floors with flat board timber ceilings and plain light fittings in a mid-20th century style. The church doors are from Thurston Manor. Some of the choir stalls came from the abbey's Mother House at Roscrea, Ireland and the benches and kneelers are from the Royal Navy dockyards in Rosyth, Fife. There is a small bespoke timber clad organ in the same style as the ceiling.

The refectory is the largest interior space and has six exposed squared stone pillars to the side walls supporting a tall vaulted timber clad roof. It has a patterned vinyl floor edged by a stone skirting. By the timber east wall there is a cantilevered marble based pulpit with a slender Festival style timber and metal railing. The decorative carved stone relief of Christ breaking bread with the two disciples at Emmaus is by Anne Davidson. The kitchens include a bread room with original bread store fittings. A basement corridor with service rooms runs under the refectory, and has rooms for printing, bookbinding and sewing. There are further workshops and the laundry housed in the flat roofed south range attached to the refectory.

There is a large irregular-plan open stair with metal and horizontal timber handrails in the large glazed entrance hall at the west corner entrance and there are large communal wash areas with cream terrazzo dado to the walls. The former oratory and library have been converted to form three en-suite infirmary bedrooms (2016).

The interior of the garage and workshop block was seen in 2017 and contains metal working and wood workshops as well as garages and stores.

Statement of Interest

Sancta Maria Abbey at Nunraw is a rare example of a purpose-built monastic abbey to be built in Britain in the 20th century. It remains in its original use as a multifunctional building for prayer and general monastic life. The rarity of its building type means it is of significant interest in the modern history of ecclesiastical architecture in Scotland.

Its site is of interest for its historical association with the Cistercian order in Scotland. The first resident monks were themselves involved in the building of the present abbey which also provides a symbolic link to the order's medieval history.

The abbey has good yet restrained architectural detailing, of Scandinavian influence, in line with the ethos of its intended use as a home for the religious community it catered for. The abbey also has many design elements contemporary with large educational and public projects built in the same period in Scotland.

In accordance with Section 1 (4A) of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) (Scotland) Act 1997 the following are excluded from the listing: two huts to the southeast.

Age and Rarity

Nunraw and the Cistercians

Sancta Maria Abbey was built on land acquired with Nunraw House, near Garvald, bought by the Cistercian monks in 1946. Nunraw House (previously a tower house) and its surrounding land had been given to the Cistercians nuns who had been established at St Mary's Nunnery near Haddington since 1158. The remains of the former nunnery are a scheduled monument (SM13573). Nunraw Tower at Garvald was at an early date known as Nunraw – meaning nuns' row – for its association with the nuns at Haddington.

The Cistercian order began in 1098 in Burgundy, France with the first known monastery built in Scotland in 1136 by the Cistercian monks from Melrose Abbey. Ten further abbeys of Cistercian monks and 13 of Cistercian nuns were eventually established in Scotland. All were destroyed to some degree around 1530 with the Dissolution of the Monasteries by Henry VIII. East Lothian has a long association with the Cistercians. The prioress of the nuns in Haddington, Elizabeth Hepburn, handed over the property at Nunraw to her family in order to keep it safe from confiscation by the authorities. Over the intervening years, Nunraw house was passed down to various well known families. In 1933 it was bought by the Spurway family who owned the much-enlarged estate until 1946.

In 1832 the Cistercians re-established themselves in Mount Melleray, Ireland from where Nunraw's Mother House was founded in 1878 at Roscrea in County Tipperary. It was from Roscrea that, after a period of searching for a suitable property, a group of monks were sent to set up a new Cistercian foundation at Nunraw, the first in Scotland for nearly 400 years. Within a couple of years, the community were sufficiently settled and self-sufficient to have their own abbot and be raised to the status of an abbey.

The new Cistercian community lived in Nunraw House (also known as Nunraw Old Abbey – listed at category A, LB7321) and an assortment of huts for over 20 years until they could move into the new abbey building in 1969. Nunraw House was then used as a residential guesthouse for visitors to the abbey until it was sold in 2014, with the intention of converting some space in the new abbey building for guests.

Although work had started in 1952, the foundation stone for the new abbey was officially laid on 22 August 1954. On the same day, many thousands undertook a pilgrimage to the abbey site to mark the celebration of the first ever Marian Year by Pope Pius XII and which coincided with the dedication of the abbey to Mary.

There are only three active Cistercian monasteries of monks in Britain and one of nuns (first located in Dorset and then in 1991 moved to Whitland, West Wales). All of the buildings for the Cistercian communities of men were built after 1832: Mount St Bernard in Leicestershire, designed by Pugin in 1835 and listed Grade II in 1989, Caldey Abbey, on the Island of Caldey in Pembrokeshire, designed in 1906 by John Coates Carter and listed at Grade II* in 1996 and Sancta Maria Abbey, Nunraw, designed in 1952 by Peter Whiston.

Monasteries and Convents in context

Following the Roman Catholic Relief Act of 1829, a number of Catholic orders and communities for religious men and women were gradually re-established in Britain from the middle of the 19th century onwards. The published work of A N W Pugin was influential in setting out a revival in medieval planning, but only one complete convent was built by the architect at Handsworth in Birmingham (1839). Often buildings and sites were adapted and extended over time, with the chapel or abbey church being the most prominent building of a group. Specialist plans were created depending on the function of the community or the characteristics of the individual order, such as austerity being a requirement for Carmelite worship. Houses for religious men or women were institutional in their nature and were often associated with schools and could either be established in an urban or rural location.

Following mass immigration, mostly from Ireland, the growing population of Roman Catholics gradually increased in Scotland as it did across the United Kingdom from the middle of the 19th century until it peaked in 1970. In the period after the Second World War there was a significant building programme for housing, schools and places of worship to serve new communities that were established around Scotland's larger urban centres. In the context of this shift in demographics, religious houses for men and women were also built throughout the 20th century to cater to the expanding population. The Roman Catholic Church was particularly active in this building programme and were proactive in working with architects to help them in commissions for new churches and schools. Prominent architectural practices, often led by a Roman Catholic architect, making a notable contribution during the interwar and post-war period in this type of building work in Scotland include Reginald Fairlie, A R Conlon, Thomas Cordiner, and Gillespie, Kidd and Coia.

The outstanding ecclesiastical work of the Swiss-French architect, Le Corbusier was much admired in Scotland in the later post-war period and was of particular relevance to new church and ecclesiastical design in the 1960s and 1970s. For example, Le Corbusier's monastery at La Tourette in France, was an important inspiration for Gillespie Kidd and Coia's St Peter's Roman Catholic seminary building at Cardross (1966) which itself is a masterpiece in Brutalist architectural design for a completely new residential religious complex (listed at category A, LB6464). A completely new Benedictine monastery, in the modern Dutch style, was planned for Cockfosters, London in 1940 by Dom Constantine Bosschaerts. However, the full scheme was not realised and it was built in much reduced form without a cloister – it had large later 20th century additions and ceased to be an Abbey in 2012. More often though, houses for religious men and women were adapted from existing buildings or exciting modern interventions were added to existing sites, such as the Church of the Resurrection at the Benedictine Abbey in West Malling, Kent by Maguire and Murray (1964–6, listed Grade II*).

On the whole, especially in the years immediately following the Second World War, traditional architectural designs were favoured for new church buildings and residential religious houses. Pluscarden Abbey (founded in 1230) near Nairn (listed at category A, LB8441) was ruined following the dissolution of the monasteries. However, the medieval buildings were reroofed and the monastic life re-established there in 1948 using and extending existing buildings. It became a fully-fledged abbey in 1974.

Sancta Maria Abbey

Sancta Maria Abbey at Nunraw is the only completely new, single-build monastic abbey built in the United Kingdom in the 20th century and there are only very few convents or monasteries erected as 'one build' which remain today. The abbey has significant interest as one of only a small number of its building type found in Scotland.

The abbey is also of interest for the quality of its mid-20th century ecclesiastical design, which is simply articulated in keeping with the austere principles of the Cistercian Order. The design of the abbey is a modern interpretation of the traditional monastic convention based around a central cloister. The architecture is austere but at the same time creates a calm, ordered and uplifting space that is still functioning as an abbey (2017).

It remains largely in the form in which it was built with only minor alterations to the interior. A photograph in Canmore of a design stage architectural model of Sancta Maria Abbey (which is also printed in The London Illustrated News of 9 June 1956), shows an ambitious initial design with a two-storey church with campanula at the northeast side of the quadrant. The budget, however, likely restricted the extent of this plan and the church was never built at the northeast side of the cloister where it was intended. Instead a single storey flat roofed wing completes the cloister at this end. The main worship space within the abbey – which has been formally arranged as a church – has been in its current position in the northwest range since 1969 and is referred to as the 'temporary church' with the aspiration of a permanent church building eventually being built.

The long rectangular plan range of detached garages and outbuildings to the southeast of the main building were built in the mid-1960s as workshops to serve the working life of the abbey community.

To the south of the site are two huts, which are contemporary with the abbey. These huts are not considered to be of special interest in listing terms and are excluded from the listing.

Architectural or Historic Interest

Interior

The interior of the abbey is simple but there is a consistent use of similar architectural design motifs and good quality craftsmanship and materials throughout the main public spaces of the building. The theme of the shallow pointed arched openings to the cloisters is reflected in the floor plan shape of the steps to the refectory. The other public spaces such as the chapel and library also have good quality yet simple detailing in a contemporary Swedish modern style. For example, the extensive use of stained timber boarding, which was typical of the 1960s.

Plan form

The plan form of the Abbey is a significant element of its interest as a purpose-built mid-20th century monastic building with a central cloister and associated ranges around it. The original plan form for the building included a church at the north side of the cloister which was never built and which leaves that side of the building as a single skin cloister corridor. Although the plan form has not been completed as originally planned, it is still legible as a religious cloister.

The lower corridor of rooms below the refectory includes a sewing room, print room and bookbinding room to serve the domestic and commercial elements of the community and are consistent with the planning of a large ecclesiastical complex.

Technological excellence or innovation, material or design quality

A significant feature of the abbey is the rubble stonework which is an important aesthetic feature of the building. It is used extensively inside and externally, especially on the long elevations. It is notable that the stone was quarried by the community themselves, having cleared and reopened Rattlebags Quarry, specifically for use on the building. (See 'Other information' below for a detailed account of the stonework.)

Much of the actual construction work for the abbey was carried out by the monks themselves with support from trained craftsmen and volunteers who came from Ireland on working holidays. Frank Riccardo (and his brother Joe), specialist Scots-Italian marble layers of Toffolo Jackson, laid the marble and terrazzo flooring in the refectory and continued to have a life-long association with the abbey. The Sphere newspaper of 9 June 1956 shows photographs of the monks laying stones and actively working on the building site in their monastic clothing. Reclaimed building materials were used in the building such as the pews from Rosyth Dockyard, the choir stalls from the Mother House of Roscrea in Ireland, and the church doors from Thurston manor, all of which predate the building.

While the cloister plan has largely dictated the form of the buildings at Nunraw, the design also has some characteristics of higher education buildings and campuses that were being built across Scotland around the same time. For example there are similarities demonstrated in the design details and massing of Sancta Maria Abbey and Pollock Halls. The A-listed Pollock Halls residential and refectory buildings in Edinburgh (LB50187) by Rowand Anderson Kininmonth and Paul, built in 1956-64, are executed in the form of open courtyards with arcades in a Swedish modern style. The original design for Pollock was drawn in 1949 by Kininmonth and may have been an inspiration for Peter Whiston when planning the abbey at Nunraw. Both buildings have traditional elements represented by the rubble stonework (a practice favoured in Scottish modernism), ironmongery and bespoke art and sculptures by contemporary artists of the period.

By the early 1950s, the rational, horizontal and unadorned forms of the Modern Movement of the interwar period developed into a more relevant and humane form of modern architecture, which was inspired by pre-war Swedish and Danish modern design. The use of rubble stonework was characteristic of this move away from the austere, rendered or concrete buildings. This change in modern architecture was exemplified, albeit in a more playful and decorative manner, at the 1951 Festival of Britain, which is illustrated by design details such as spindly railings, jaunty balconies, as well as rubble stonework. Many of these characteristics are evident in the design of Sancta Maria Abbey although here they are more restrained. In the mid 1930s the abbey's architect, Peter Whiston spent time in Sweden and France and would have been familiar with developments in modern architecture abroad and in particular Scandinavia.

The Dictionary of Scottish Architects notes that Peter Whiston (1912–99) held the post of chief architect to the Scottish Special Housing Association from 1946 until 1950. He left to set up his own practice apparently disillusioned with the direction of social housing and planning in Scotland at the time. Whiston subsequently produced a significant body of work of small scale ecclesiastical commissions across central Scotland. His design for Sancta Maria Abbey was one of his earliest contracts in independent practice and the work was apparently carried out on a voluntary basis, perhaps because he was looking for work in setting up his own business. Although Whiston was a Roman Catholic his commissions were spread across Roman Catholic, Church of Scotland and other Christian denominations.

Other works by Whiston from the period include the Scandinavian inspired simple pitched roofed ensembles of St Mary Magdalene's in Perth which he designed in 1958 and St Mark's RC Oxgangs of 1959. The later small church commissions of St Bernadette's, Tullibody (1961) and St Paul's Muirhouse (1968) have developed into a style of dual mono-pitch design. St Columba's Church, Cupar designed in 1964 is an unusual small buttressed rotunda design. Whiston has been described as balancing 'post-war modernism with a sense of Scottish restraint.' He was known to use recycled materials in many of his commissions and it is possibly his early association with the Cistercians at Nunraw that inspired this simple, sustainable approach to his work.

The small bespoke organ is dated 1971 and was built by Noel Mander of London. Its box casing is light wood vertical boarding in a similar style to the ceiling of the church. Mander was a highly experienced organ builder and restorer who carried out many large works in England and North America over his lengthy career. He was responsible for the rebuilding of the Willis organ in St Paul's Cathedral from 1972-77 for which he was appointed an OBE in 1979. The organ at Nunraw is one of only two organs he designed in Scotland.

Setting

The topography surrounding the monastery is flat and the site is located at the brow of one hill within an area of arable farmland. The site has far reaching views to the north although the wider topography means that the building is not prominent in the surrounding area thereby affording it a sense of seclusion even though it sits on top of a hill.

Regional variations

There are no known regional variations.

Close Historical Associations

The association of the site of the abbey with the ancestral land of the Cistercians nuns in Scotland is of historic interest and the site was specifically chosen for its historical association with this order. The land at Nunraw (or Nun's Row) was originally owned by the Cistercian nuns of Haddington.

External Links

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.