Knox may have referred to the 'casting down' of abbeys etc, but this did not mean that they were physically destroyed, merely overthrown, as the reformers needed some of them as parish churches, though some of them were certainly vandalised as Kilwinning may well have been. However Kilwinning Abbey, like other pre-Reformation religious houses did not fall into ruin due to the actions of the Reformers. Those that had not already been destroyed by English armies fell into ruin simply because they no longer had the revenues and rents to support them from their wider lands. The required buildings were now only parish churches and small parishes, like Kilwinning, could not afford to maintain such large properties. Wind and weather did most of the damage thereafter, though much of Kilwinning Abbey was still standing by the time Timothy Pont visited Scotland in the early 17th century. The structure of this monastery," says Pont, "was solid and grate, all of freestone cutte, the church fair and staitly after ye modell of yat of Glasgow, with a fair steiple of 7 score foote of height, yet standing quhen I myselve did see it."