Closed before 2020: by July 2019 the former Poor Clare monastery at Lynton had been taken over by the Sisters of Mary Morning Star (listed separately).
Holy Trinity Monastery (Howton Grove Priory), Herefordshire (former)
Benedictine, nuns
Howton Grove
A diocesan Benedictine monastery founded in 2004 by former Stanbrook nuns at East Hendred and moved to Howton Grove, Wormbridge, Herefordshire, in 2012. By June 2025 only one nun remained; she lived at Minster Abbey from November 2024 to May 2025 and then as a solitary in Wantage, supported by a £500,000 life-interest trust. The charity gave its remaining assets (£887,710 in June 2025, plus £12,070 in September) to the Minster Abbey trust and was to be closed after its final accounts to 30 September 2025.
Carmelite Monastery of Our Alone Saviour and St Mary the Virgin, Ware
Discalced Carmelite, nuns
Ware
Founded from Notting Hill in 1925 and at Ware Park since 1958. In mid-2024 Savills (Cambridge) offered the monastery and associated buildings (about 20,209 sq ft) for sale, inviting unconditional offers for the freehold by 26 July 2024; the listing has since been withdrawn. A local walking-trail leaflet of May 2026 says the monastery 'used to house' the Carmelite nuns. The Carmelite Monastery Ware Trust spent £425,127 against income of £13,556 in the year to April 2025. Where the sisters went and whether the sale completed is not publicly reported; the Association of British Carmels still lists Ware, but its list also still includes Carmels closed in 2023 and 2024.
Closed in 2023; the six remaining sisters moved to other Carmels. The five-acre site was put on the market through CBRE in June 2023 at about £2m and was later sold to a private buyer for an undisclosed sum. In July 2026 a plan was lodged to turn part of the site into a children's nursery.
The monastery building became unfit for use and the community, which the Hawarden sisters had joined in 2018, had to leave in 2021, living in diocesan presbyteries until it bought the Much Birch monastery in Herefordshire in May 2023 after failing to raise funds to rebuild in the diocese. In January 2025 the Nottingham RC Diocesan Trustees applied to demolish the monastery and make the site a community garden, keeping the adjoining parish church.
Closed in October 2024; the nine remaining nuns could not keep up the 28-bedroom Victorian house, which cost £30,000 a year to heat, and were relocated to other British Carmels. The property was put on the market in November 2024 at £3m and is shown as sold subject to contract; the entrance cottages remain with the Carmelite Order. Proceeds are to be invested in the order's other properties.
St Mary's Abbey, Colwich (former community of English Benedictine nuns)
Benedictine, nuns
Colwich
The community dispersed on 31 October 2020, when it had fallen to five nuns: two infirm sisters went to Oulton Abbey, two to Stanbrook Abbey, and the abbess stayed on site for a year. The property was offered for sale and some furnishings auctioned. In June 2024 the Benedictines of Mary, Queen of Apostles (Missouri) were announced as taking over the abbey (listed separately).
St Mary's Abbey, Oulton (former)
Benedictine, nuns
Oulton, Stone
The monastic community closed in 2019: with only three nuns left, the remaining sisters joined Stanbrook Abbey. The last abbess, Dame Benedicta Scott, stayed on as a resident of the Oulton Abbey nursing home until her death in March 2024. The buildings are now occupied by Oulton Abbey Care Home and the chapel continues as a Mass center.