Exeter College

The iron gates of Exeter College open onto a quadrangle dominated by the steep, dark roof of the chapel and a tower that seems to pull the sky down toward Turl Street. Founded in thirteen fourteen by Walter de Stapledon, a bishop from Devon, the college provided a place for local men to study theology. During the nineteenth century, the rector John Prideaux Coxe insisted on a chapel that mirrored the medieval Sainte-Chapelle in Paris, creating a distinct, soaring silhouette against the city skyline.