Kylemore Abbey is a Benedictine monastery founded in 1920 on the grounds of Kylemore Castle, in Connemara, County Galway, Ireland. The abbey was founded for Benedictine Nuns who fled Belgium in World War I.
Kylemore Castle was built as a private home for the family of Mitchell Henry, a wealthy politician from Manchester, England who was also an MP for Galway County from 1871 to 1885. The castle was designed by James Franklin Fuller and Ussher Roberts. Construction first began in 1867, and took one hundred men four years to complete.
The castle covered approximately 40,000 square feet (3,700 m) with over 70 rooms and the principal wall was two to three feet thick. The facade measured 142 feet (43 m) in length and is made of granite brought from Dalkey by sea to Letterfrack and limestone from Ballinasloe. There were 33 bedrooms, 4 bathrooms, 4 sitting rooms, ballroom, billiard room, library, study, school room, smoking room, gun room and various offices and domestic staff residences for the butler, cook, housekeeper and other servants.
Henry sold the castle to the Duke and Duchess of Manchester in 1903, who lived there several years. In 1920 the Irish Benedictine Abbeys purchased the castle and lands. Previously the nuns, who had been based in Ypres for several hundred years, had been forced to leave during World War I. The nuns opened an international boarding school and established a day school for local girls, which closed in June 2010. Since the 70s, the Benedictine community have opened their Abbey and Estate to the public. |
