The original title of the monastery is the Abbey of our Lady of the Quarry because there used to be a stone quarry in neighbouring Binstead. Quarr stone was used in the Tower of London and has recently helped to prove the date of the White Tower.
Ancient Quarr Abbey was founded in 1132 by Baldwin de Redvers, earl of Exeter and fourth lord of the Isle of Wight.
Little now remains of the ancient abbey which was suppressed by Henry VIII in 1536. The Abbey was demolished and its stone used for fortifications at Cowes and Yarmouth. One of the three abbey bells still calls to worship since it is now at Binstead parish church.
Bones found in the north wall of the church are thought to be those of Baldwin de Redvers, the founder of the Abbey. The thigh bone belonged to a man of abnormal proportions — the grave itself is 2.05meters (6ft 9ins). The remains of Baldwin's wife, princess Cicely, daughter of King Edward IV, also still lie on the site of ancient Quarr Abbey. 
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It was the monks from Savigny whom Balwin appealed to for his monastic foundation. The abbey of Savigny lies on the edge of the forest of that name, some eighty kilometres (50 miles) to the south-west of Balwin’s Norman lands, just where Normandy, Maine and Brittany meet. Balwin may well have known the founder, Vitalis, but it was the second abbot, Geoffrey, 1122-1139, who created the Order of Savigny and who sent a group of monks to the Isle of Wight. Quarr was established at the height of Savigny’s reputation, for Geoffrey was even more of a saint and reformer than the founder and the observance was exemplary. Further, Abbot Geoffrey and King Henry I were on most friendly terms.
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Geoffrey agreed to send about a dozen of his monks to the Isle of Wight for the foundation at Quarr with Gervase as the first abbot and the foundation is generally agreed to have taken place in 1131 or 1132.
The Foundation charter bears no date but has been the subject of a penetrating study. It is written in an unusual venerable diploma form which requires no seal, but each witness puts a sign of the cross before his name. It can be deduced by the signatories that the charter took its final shape on some occasion between 1141 and 1143. This is some ten years after the settlement at Quarr and a five or so years after Abbot Geoffrey of Savigny had died.
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