Eco-Friendly Nunnery Features Solar Panels, Composting Toilet

Not every nunnery has solar panels on the roof. But, most nunneries don’t have cats named after Britney Spears running around either. The Benedictine nuns at Stanbrook Abbey in Worcester, England are preparing to bid goodbye to the Victorian convent that has been their home for many years to move to a new environmentally friendly monastery being built in the North York Moors national park.  The new convent – made of recycled materials and responsibly-sourced timber - will have rainwater harvesting, reedbed sewage systems, sedum roofs, and a woodchip boiler.

From The Guardian:

“We’re running a big building, spending thousands of pounds that we don’t have on looking after the place and heating it with oil and gas, which isn’t good for the environment. We’re here for the monastic life and it is being impinged on,” she said.

“Stanbrook Abbey was built for the time, they didn’t have heating. They had one tap and no bathrooms. It’s been adapted since but it’s still too big for us and we’re not museum curators.”

In a brief to the architects, the nuns stated their vision for their new premises. In addition to being sensitive to environmental concerns, a monastery for women should “contain some natural curved surfaces and shapes”. The new building, designed by the 2008 Stirling prizewinners Feilden Clegg Bradley Studios, will allow them to live simply. There will be broadband-ready bedrooms for up to 30 nuns, a church, library and ancillary buildings. It also incorporates a retreat for up to 15 guests as hospitality is common to Benedictine traditions. The nuns will be in harmony with the heritage of their surroundings, studded with the ruins of Whitby, Rievaulx and Byland abbeys and Mount Grace Priory. “We are supposed to love creation and respect the environment. We’re living in and taking care of it,” said Savage.

How inspiring. It’s so great to hear about this sort of thing happening – and truly, how better to show gratitude for the wonders of nature than to be a responsible steward of the land and its resources? No doubt the nuns and their cat, Britney, will thoroughly enjoy their new eco-friendly country home.

Link [The Guardian]
Photo credit: BenedictineNuns.org

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