Oxford is the City of Dreaming Spires and university colleges. Many of the most well known like Christ Church and Magdalene, charge visitors to enter, but many of the smaller, less well known colleges are still free.
Lincoln College is one of the small colleges on Turl Street in the Centre of Oxford and is reached through a wooden door off the street. It was founded in the C15th and has walls covered in virginia creeper around the small quads.
Visitors are allowed up Staircase 2 in the Front Quad to what is thought to have been John Wesley’s room which can be viewed through a glass door. The library is in the splendid C18th “All Saints’ Church”:http://wasleys.org.uk/eleanor/churches/england/cotswolds/oxfordshire/oxfordcity/allsaints/index.html but this is not open to visitors.
The chapel on the south side of the Front Quad was built in the C17th and is Perpendicular in style. It has recently undergone a major restoration restoring it to the condition when it was built and has a lovely panelled wooden ceiling.
The chapel was locked when I visited and I had to take photographs through the glass door in the cedar wood screen across the back of the chapel. The Porter’s Lodge may have a key.
The walls are lined with dark wood stalls. The C17th windows are enamelled rather than stained glass. This involves painting the windows and then firing them in a kiln. The east window has six scenes from the gospels along the top with six old testament scenes along the bottom. Second from the right is the whale spitting out Jonah.
Lincoln College is fee to visit. According to the website, the college is open 2-5 Monday-Friday and 11-5 at the weekends. I visited on a Saturday at 2pm and was told the college was shut, although I was allowed a quick look in the chapel. The post code is OX1 3DR and the grid reference is SP 515063.
