Listed property has plans for private residence

The Convent 22 High Street Bridlington NBFP PA1449-3b

The largest Grade II star listed building in the Bridlington area has been sold.

The Covent of Mercy has been purchased by a family from Oxford who plan to use the building as a private residence.

A planning application has been submitted to the East Riding of Yorkshire Council in order to change the usage of the building from a convent to a dwelling house.

The building includes five reception rooms, kitchen and utility Room, 10 bedrooms, and is centrally heated over three floors and has a large garden.

The property dates back to the 1700s in Old Town’s High Street. The building was originally a private residence before it became a school in 1930 and from 1962 it was home to nuns of the Sisters of Mercy order but their numbers were in a steady decline.

To keep the convent going for the last two remaining sisters out of the original group of seven is not viable and the order put the convent up for sale.

The two remaining Sisters, Sister Maureen and Sister Hillary, departed and moved to another of the order’s convents in the country. The Sisters of Mercy was founded in Dublin in 1831 with the aim of caring for the poor and particularly young women and children to whom they tried to give sufficient skills to get out of the poverty trap.

In Bridlington they had a pastoral role, visiting the sick and elderly and supporting people in their own homes.

Sister Barbara, a Trustee of the Sisters of Mercy said in December: “We do not have enough sisters to go round our various properties. It is the end of an era for Bridlington and hope it will go to the right person who will have a loving care for it.”

Currently there are 231 Sisters ministering from 49 sites in Britain with convents still in Whitby and Filey.

The sale was handled by Harrison Bell Associates who described it as a “rare and interesting building with a wealth of history.”