Friars Court

About the venue

Mid-17th-century Cotswold stone house inside a 500-year-old moat at Clanfield, Oxfordshire, on a site founded by the Knights of St John in 1149. A ceremony-only venue: vows in the gardens for up to 80, with the Garden Room as the indoor option, and receptions held elsewhere.

Friars Court was founded in 1149 by the Monastic Knights of St John, as their first hospitallery in Oxfordshire. After the Reformation it became a private house. The present Cotswold stone building dates from the mid-17th century and stands inside a moat thought to be more than 500 years old.

The moat was dug to keep livestock out and to farm silver carp, not for defence. It encloses three acres of gardens divided into smaller rooms, among them the Winterhalter Rose Garden, the formal Lion Garden and a newer Labyrinth Garden. The old carp ponds were filled in around 1850 and restored in 2000, and now hold water lilies beside two living willow tunnels.

The Willmer family arrived as tenant farmers in 1917 and bought the house three years later. Charles Willmer now lives here and runs the 630-acre farm, where curlews nested on restored wetland for the first time in 2023. A private museum in the Coach House shows finds going back to Roman times.

Friars Court hosts civil ceremonies only, and has done so for more than 20 years. Between May and September, groups of 12 to 48 can book a guided garden tour with a homemade cream tea for £20 a head. Two caravan sites sit on the Thames nearby, one of them on a three-acre island reached by an arched bridge.

Founded by the Knights of St John in 1149

Mid-17th-century Cotswold stone house

Three acres of gardens inside a moat

Ceremony-only venue

Garden ceremonies for up to 80

Garden Room as the wet-weather option

Over 20 years of civil ceremonies

Garden tours with cream tea in summer