In 1221 a band of 13 Dominican friars arrived in England, in the train of Peter des Roches bishop of Winchester, and passed through Canterbury on their way to London, which they reached on 10 August. At Canterbury they presented themselves to Archbishop Stephen Langton, who ordered their prior, Gilbert de Fresnoy, to preach before him, and was so much impressed with his sermon that he became henceforth a warm friend of the order. It was, however, under Archbishop Edmund Rich that the Friars Preachers first made a permanent settlement in Canterbury, probably by invitation of the archbishop. Their chief founder and benefactor, however, was the king. On the 10th March, 1236-7, Henry III granted them an island in the Stour and during the next 23 years the friars received of the royal bounty sums of money, between 1237 and 1259, amounting in all to nearly £500.

The church was the first building of the priory to be erected. It was begun in 1237 and almost completed by 1244 and was dedicated to the king's patron saint, Edward the Confessor, whilst the other monastic buildings seem to have been built by about 1260. A grant of £20 in 1259 was given towards building the kitchen.

The layout of the ranges of monastic buildings and the church was arranged around a centrally placed cloister. To the south lay the monastic church; to the east the eastern range appears to have consisted of the Prior's Lodging with prior's dormitory and perhaps guest's dormitory above; and the chapter house attached to the east with access from the Prior's Lodgings and the cloister. The north range appears to have consisted of perhaps cellarer's range with the friar's dormitory above; at the western end of the range was the kitchen and to the north of the range probably the reredorter probably with some sort of first floor access from the dormitory. The western range appears to have been taken up by the refectory, with a guest hall across the small river to the west.

The monastry was supressed at the Dissolution in 1538 and the buildings and land let to become a weaving factory. By the mid 17th century many of the old monastry buildings were no longer standing, only the refectory, the guest hall and the buildings on the north side of the old cloister survived.

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