Church of England in rural Kent: visitors to All Saints Church Biddenden

Welcome to All Saints Church Biddenden, in the diocese of Canterbury.

Location: High Street, Biddenden, Kent TN27 8AJ.
This page gives opening times and an introduction to the church's history.
Use this map to find us.
Check the BBC weather widget below for a three-day forecast.

The church is open to all comers each Thursday morning all year round. Refreshments are served to visitors and Biddenden residents alike and all are welcome. Simple lunches of soup and bread are offered at certain times of the year, please check the Notices page.

In addition, a big effort is made to keep All Saints open to visitors between 10am and 4pm each day during the summer months. This relies on the commitment of a team of volunteers who sit in the church and supervise. Please note that during the winter months, and at any time in the summer when a volunteer is unable to attend, the church has to remain closed.

If you think you can volunteer for a two-hour slot each week, please contact Anne Giles on 01580 291762.

All Saints Biddenden is well worth a stop for people visiting nearby Sissinghurst Castle Garden. There is evidence that there was a church in Biddenden at the time of the Norman conquest in 1066, but it was not the one we see now. Today's church is believed to be essentially that built in the mid to late 1200s of local sandstone, with some later use of Kentish ragstone, flint and "Bethersden marble".

But construction work did not stop in the 1200s. All Saints was enlarged and re-ordered according to the village's increasing prosperity, transient political ideologies or simply the changing needs and pressures of modern life.

The building you admire today is essentially by, for and about the people who shaped it. Throughout its 700-year history you will encounter religious upheaval and extravagant philantropy, martyrdom and legendary personalities. Their lives have woven a thread of continuity through this place of worship that has stood at the community's heart for hundreds of years.

Guide Books

Booklets are on sale in the church to help guide you round the building and its famous collection of brasses, and to take home as souvenirs:

Children can try and tackle our church quiz, download here ahead of your visit.

Biddenden in Pictures

A pictorial history of Biddenden in photographs is published by Biddenden Local History Society and can be bought online from YouByYou Books. The book includes previously unpublished old photographs of people, places and events in the village, with views including the High Street and All Saints Church.

Biddenden weather

BBC weather outlook for the Ashford area: