The Abbey has been recognised as a building of outstanding historic and architectural interest and is considered to be a 'textbook' example of an English medieval manor house.

Several construction phases took place during the Middle Ages, carried out by prominent figures like Solomon of Rochester, Thomas Beckington and William Say, but it was not until the seventeenth century that the current plan was completed.

After being inhabited by Eve Fleming, the estate was bought by David Astor in 1958, who leased it to the Ockenden Venture which offered sanctuary to refugees and displaced children.

In 1978, the Astor family sold the house and in 1980 it came into possession of The New Era Centre, a non-profit charity led by Fred Blum and Bishop Stephen Verney.

[5] Originally, The Abbey's main entrance to was through a rear door of the passage separating the service wing from the great hall.

Nowadays, the main entrance is on the east side with a Gothic arch, a 1980s insertion replacing a narrow door, leading to the courtyard.

Edward Blore made sketches of the interior of the hall and of the house as seen from the northwest, which served as the basis of the engravings published by John Henry Parker in 1853.

[8] The service wing is located at the southwest corner of the building, the southern part of its west range, and was built in the late thirteenth century.

On the ground floor in the southwest end, the wing seems to incorporate a stone wall of an earlier structure, in which lateral chimney stacks have been built with fireplaces dating from the nineteenth century.

[5] The great hall survives open to the roof, with one cruck truss carrying a king post which is unique in that a ceiling has never hidden it.

[8] In the courtyard between the north and west range is a timber-framed staircase outshut, dating from before the stone casing of the early fourteenth century.

[14] The first floor of these western three bays originally served as a great chamber, the second most important room in a medieval English manor house.

[17] The roof of the southern bay of the east range was black-smokened and may have served as a kitchen or brewhouse at some time into which a chimney was later inserted.

[18] As a result of this enlargement of the curtilage, The Abbey now stands in the midst of extensive grounds and is approached by a lime tree avenue across the enclosure allotment, leading near to the east of the house.

Although the avenue across the grounds appears to have existed before the enclosure (some trees are older than 1804) the house stood on the eastern edge of its curtilage until 1798.

The guest house area contains apple, elder, ivy, spindle, wayfarer and yew alongside plants like climbing roses, ferns and sage.

[19] The courtyard garden has a fig tree, Magnolia, roses and a medieval style flower bed surrounded by a mature Buxus hedging.

Vegetables grown in the kitchen garden are artichoke, carrot, chard, courgette, kale, leek, maize, marrow, potato and pumpkin, which are used for consumption.

[19] The grounds have resident muntjacs and common wild animals include hedgehogs, grey squirrels, foxes, shrews, voles and woodmice, besides many insect and bird species.

[20] In the seventh century, Sutton was gifted by King Ine of Wessex to Abingdon Abbey, a Benedictine monastery which had a strong local influence and extensive property in this area at the time, supposedly founded in 675.

[18] The south and east ranges at The Abbey were completed around the middle of the fifteenth century, just before Thomas Courtenay, 6th/14th Earl of Devon, who was involved in the Wars of the Roses, was beheaded in 1461 and had his lands confiscated.

[33] In the late eighteenth century, the Justices began to extend the original leasehold curtilage by buying the freehold of adjoining tenements.

Astor died in December 2001,[41] and is buried in All Saints' parish churchyard, Sutton Courtenay in a grave with a simple headstone bearing only his name and years of birth and death.

After months of torrential rain that hindered work, the house was sold in 1980 to The New Era Centre, a non-profit charity established by Fred Blum in 1967.

They became friends, "like brothers", and Verney became a trustee and significant supporter and contributor to the creation and work of The New Era Centre at The Abbey, which became a registered charity on 20 December 1979.

The residential community of The New Era Centre in The Abbey was dedicated on 4 October 1981 as a space to explore and work towards the synthesis of Christianity and more contemporary understandings of societal transformation.

Stephen Verney extensively discussed, and believed in, the role Buddhist practice and philosophy could play in increasing connectivity with a Christian deity, and it was this belief which led many of The New Era Centre's early pursuits.

Upon the purchase of The Abbey by The New Era Centre in 1980, a monumental effort was required to source volunteer labour, both locally and from abroad.

Rooted in the Christian tradition yet open to other faiths, The Abbey, Sutton Courtenay is to this day home to a small resident community and serves as a spiritual retreat and conference centre.

[22] In 2008, The Abbey, Sutton Courtenay launched its own website and in 2019 a history research project started as part of its 40th Anniversary Programme.