Grammar school cloisters, Plympton

The old Plympton Grammar School has magnificent stone colonnades in the cloisters and is situated in the centre of Plymton St Maurice, or Plymton Earle as it has otherwise been known. The grammar school was built about 1664 in a Jacobean Gothic style and restored in 1870. Much of the original building remains, including the school room and the granite arcade or cloisters. The school is famous for its assocaitions with Sir Joshua Reynolds, the English portrait painter and first president of the Royal Academy whose father was headmaster of the School. Joshua was born at Plympton in 1723 and spent his boyhood in the town.