The appointment of the first female Dean of Exeter Cathedral has been announced by Downing Street.
The Very Reverend Arwen Mary Folkes, currently Vicar of St Mary-the-Virgin in Eastbourne, is due to start in her new role in Devon on 9 May 2027.
Folkes was born in Barnstaple in North Devon and baptised in Bideford, before growing up at the Lizard Lighthouse in Cornwall, where her father was one of the last live-in lighthouse keepers for Trinity House.
She said: “It seems I have been entrusted with a new lighthouse, and a rather bigger one this time.”
First female Dean of 970-year-old cathedral https://t.co/7gElus9usu
— BBC South West (@BBCSpotlight) November 10, 2026
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