The Abbey Church, built in 1902 by French Benedictine monks at Appuldurcombe House, near Ventnor (Isle of Wight), was one of the largest iron churches ever erected in the UK. When the monks moved to their permanent base at Quarr Abbey, near Ryde, in 1908, the church went with them (showing its portability), then in 1913 – after the Abbey had been completed – it was gifted to a Trappist community in Devon. The wooden frame still survives, now enclosing a swimming pool in a new housing development.
