A small amount of rather shoddy photos surfaced of this building recently with only some vague description about what and where it was, so with a small amount of effort I was able to track it down. It's one large building at the rear of a very much in use hospital located just north of London, an area of the country I really don't explore much in despite it being only just over an hour from my front door.

The building was constructed in 1936 around a decade after the hospital initially opened and throughout it's whole working life was a convalescent ward, at the start mainly for long stay TB patients but in later life a general recovery ward for children post-surgery. In the early 1980s following a restructuring of the NHS the hospital came under a different health authority, up until that point children had been ferried from the main hospital site to the convalescent ward by a towed ambulance, however at some point in the early 1980s the vehicle broke and the new health authority refused to repair or replace it, and this led to the closure of the building in the first half of the 1980s, probably in a further cost-cutting effort.

Hospital buildings that have been closed since the 1990s or earlier are becoming more and more uncommon in the UK now, most of them closed in the 90s or earlier have long been demolished - I could reel off a list of amazing hospitals that closed in the last decades of the 20th Century sadly no longer of this Earth. Of the ones that are left, finding one in such a beautiful state of natural decay with only a small amount of tagging inside is nigh on impossible, but there this building has sat for nearly forty years pretty much ignored by everyone!

That being said, it's one of the most rotten, falling apart, sketchy buildings (on the upstairs) I've ever stepped foot in. Not quite the same 'I'm going to plummet to my death every step I take' feeling experienced in Brownsville or, for that matter, Hawick Hospital in Scotland but it was certainly up there with them. I do absolutely love shooting buildings in advanced decay like this, as much as the clean spots are cool I find these so much more photogenic than a sterile recently closed hospital.

1


2


3


4


5


6


7


8


9


10


11


12


13


14


15


16


17


18


19


20


21


22


23


24


Thanks for looking

Great set as always. I love the lighting in some of these, particularly 6, 17, and 18. There's really something to be said about a place that has reached this level of decay absent a layer of spraypaint.

Wow, this is a beautiful place! I too think 17 and 18 are amazing, especially the depth in 17.

Thanks for sharing

Lovely set dude. I love how you mention how sketchy Brownsville was but leave out that you almost got gobbled up by a Catskills hotel... you and your sketchy floors....

Posted by EsseXploreR Lovely set dude. I love how you mention how sketchy Brownsville was but leave out that you almost got gobbled up by a Catskills hotel... you and your sketchy floors....

That was a fun day out though!

Dude this is beautiful period. Also your shots themselves too!

Hospitals are my bucketlist to go to- hopefully with still intact equipment, so the jealousy is real

i never comment on many of your sets even though they are always really good and i always watch to see what you post. Somehow i have never felt like you really enjoyed the girl explorers here giving an opinion of your work... i hope i am wrong... but, i really enjoyed this location. The paint peel is unreal!! Im intrigued by it and the conveyor in pic 6. Do you know what it was used for here? also, really like the way that door is separating in 14. That old rusted gurney in pic 18 is very cool too.

Posted by MisUnderstood! i never comment on many of your sets even though they are always really good and i always watch to see what you post. Somehow i have never felt like you really enjoyed the girl explorers here giving an opinion of your work... i hope i am wrong... but, i really enjoyed this location. The paint peel is unreal!! Im intrigued by it and the conveyor in pic 6. Do you know what it was used for here? also, really like the way that door is separating in 14. That old rusted gurney in pic 18 is very cool too.

Absolutely wrong on that assumption, I dunno what made you think that!

As for the conveyor belt contraption, I haven't a clue if I'm honest. It likely came from a different area of the hospital and was placed in there when no longer needed, potentially from the stores or kitchen area.

Posted by mookster Absolutely wrong on that assumption, I dunno what made you think that! As for the conveyor belt contraption, I haven't a clue if I'm honest. It likely came from a different area of the hospital and was placed in there when no longer needed, potentially from the stores or kitchen area.

Thank You for clearing that up in my mind, im glad i WAS wrong! Yes, i have been thinking that conveyor must of came from the kitchen area too. Yet, i was hoping for a new spin on it, lol, possibly some contraption to move dead bodies from the holding area, to the morgue, would of been good

Posted by MisUnderstood! possibly some contraption to move dead bodies

Now I want conveyors circling the room at my funeral.....