Report - St Crispins, Northampton - Nov 2011

[a_little_feisty]

This is another one of those sites that has been done to death, but as it's been a while since anyone posted a report on it thought I'd post my pics from a visit last month with my friend LadyHayles on what was her first proper explore.


History Highlights Since Closure:

The hospital finally closed in 1995 and the main buildings are currently standing derelict with only one of the wards having been converted. A housing estate has been built on the lands that were cleared around the main building and a new mental health facility, Berrywood Hospital, has also been built on part of the site. As with many of these projects, the developer, Taylor Wimpey has built a large number of new homes on the site and not concentrated on preserving the original buildings. Due to the 2008-2010 recession the work was again put on hold and the hospital site has deteriorated rapidly leaving them in a poor state of repair.

Work to restore the remaining buildings left standing has restarted this year and this was certainly evident during our visit. Apparently the large clock tower is to become one large appartment with a spiral staircase running up through the centre.

Even now in it's stripped out state this place has such an eerie feel. On the day of our last visit I was sat at home in the evening reading some forum posts by a gentleman in his 70's who used to work there and was describing certain wards and parts of the site and the patients housed there. Very interesting reading, particularly as we had been walking round those very rooms early in the day and had been trying to figure out what they were.


The photographs:

Thanks for looking!