It's fair to say 2011 wasn't kind to me - my heath was generally shit and too much real life stuff like getting married and buying a house took up my free time.
So 2012 started better on a cold, wet, but sometimes sunny afternoon at 'the local'
It's coming around to 4 years since I first, finally, entered the previous unexplored Barrow Hospital with Rooks & Rigsby.
For Barrow once thwarted many who tried to see inside during the early days after its somewhat quick but quiet closure.
To look back at now it's almost impossible to compare the place then to what it now has become.
After that first visit I would return to the site many times over the period of the next 12 months and document the majority of the site while watching it go from its almost 'closed yesterday' state to crumble and demolition. Somewhere after that something strange happened, those bits that remained started to decay.
To coin Withnail's famous line would be easy but it's true to say that at Barrow, There is no beauty without decay.
For what was once an interesting but relatively plain and boring site now has much more character than years past. What the future lies for the site is uncertain. The land owners have tried and failed with housing, industrial and care village plans. Perhaps the most fitting thing would be for the wildlife that adorned the site 90 years previous take back that land and taking the torrid history of the countries dirtiest hospital with it.
You can find some more photos and a complete history on my website here - For anyone interested the photos were shot on a Canon 300N with Kodak C41 B&W ISO 400 Film. Thanks for looking
So 2012 started better on a cold, wet, but sometimes sunny afternoon at 'the local'
It's coming around to 4 years since I first, finally, entered the previous unexplored Barrow Hospital with Rooks & Rigsby.
For Barrow once thwarted many who tried to see inside during the early days after its somewhat quick but quiet closure.
To look back at now it's almost impossible to compare the place then to what it now has become.
After that first visit I would return to the site many times over the period of the next 12 months and document the majority of the site while watching it go from its almost 'closed yesterday' state to crumble and demolition. Somewhere after that something strange happened, those bits that remained started to decay.
To coin Withnail's famous line would be easy but it's true to say that at Barrow, There is no beauty without decay.
For what was once an interesting but relatively plain and boring site now has much more character than years past. What the future lies for the site is uncertain. The land owners have tried and failed with housing, industrial and care village plans. Perhaps the most fitting thing would be for the wildlife that adorned the site 90 years previous take back that land and taking the torrid history of the countries dirtiest hospital with it.
You can find some more photos and a complete history on my website here - For anyone interested the photos were shot on a Canon 300N with Kodak C41 B&W ISO 400 Film. Thanks for looking
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