2014 Vacation: UK / England / Stratford-upon-Avon: Town Walk

Stratford-upon-Avon: Town Walk

We walked a lot in Stratford-upon-Avon. Here are some interesting buildings we saw..

Shakespeare Birthplace Trust

The Shakespeare Birthplace Trust is the world’s leading charity in promoting the works, life and times of William Shakespeare, responsible for the five buildings that make up the Shakespeare experience (Shakespeare’s Birthplace, Anne Hathaway’s Cottage, Nash’s House & New Place, Halls Croft and Mary Arden’s Farm), as well as an extensive library collection. The Trust holds the world’s largest Shakespeare-related museum and its archives are open to the public.

Guild Chapel – Stratford-upon-Avon

The Guild Chapel one of Stratford’s best-known buildings. Situated on the corner of Chapel Lane and Church Street, it overlooks the site of New Place, Shakespeare’s Stratford home, in which he died, in April 1616.

From the website.. Guild of Holy Cross, click here..
The Bishop of Worcester licensed Stratford’s Guild of the Holy Cross to build a chapel and hospital in the town in 1269. Religious guilds existed in most medieval English towns and they came to play an important part in the townspeople’s daily lives. The hospital was intended to provide care for needy priests and formed the basis of the complex of buildings that the guild was to develop in the town over the following three-hundred years. These buildings included almshouses to house its elderly members, and the original schoolhouse, where one of the guild’s priests taught Latin grammar to young boys.

It was largely remodelled in the 15th Century by Sir Hugh Clopton, Lord Mayor of London.