Forde Abbey near Chard on the Somerset-Dorset border 

Built as a Cistercian monastery, Forde Abbey sits in 30 acres of gardens on the Somerset-Dorset border. Owned by the Roper family since 1864 the Great Pond, Cloisters and vaulted Undercroft remain as monastic features. The Abbey survives absentee landlords and civil war as its prosperity waxes and wanes. In 1815, philanthropist and tenant Jeremy Bentham hosts some of the great 19th century thinkers including John Stuart Mill.

Richard de Broniis builds a priory at Brightley in Devon for 12 Cistercian monks in 1133-36 but the monks abandon it. Richard's sister Adelicia de Brioniis offers the monks the use of the Manor of Thorncombe and a site on the River Axe. Within seven years the monastery of Forde Abbey is built. The Abbey flourishes for 400 years until the Dissolution of the Monasteries under Henry VIII. Forde is gifted to the Crown and falls into private hands. Over the last three centuries the Dorset Gardens are progressively and successfully developed and form a major visitor attraction.