History
Construction of Whitchurch Hospital began in 1898 and it was officially opened in 1908. Like most Victorian asylums it was designed to be fully self-sufficient with it's own farm, water and power supplies. During the Second World War part of the hospital was put under control of the military and it became the largest emergency hospital in South Wales. In 1948 it was taken over by the Ministry of Health as the NHS came into being and was fully utilised until care in the community systems beginning in the 1980s saw patient numbers begin to decrease. Phasing down of the hospital began in the mid 2000s with services beginning to move to new buildings elsewhere, and the hospital officially closed in April 2016.
The Explore
A massive thanks to @mookster for the tips for this one! Explored with @Balannah on a nice sunny day. We got into the buildings easily with no problems. However after about 10 minutes of exploring we soon realised we weren't the only ones in the building. We pressed on regardless, not knowing if it was security or anyone else inside with us. With multiple voices and footsteps around the main entrance and admin area we scurried off to the eastern wards and started our explore there.
After this we headed towards the water tower and climbed to the top to get some shots.
Whilst we were up there I had a look over towards the main entrance of the hospital and spotted two ambulances and an orange tent. On the bowling green were around 30 or so paramedics having lunch. They were using parts of the hospital for training, that put us at ease a bit more as to who was inside the building with us! Heading down we worked our way back towards the main hall.
From here we headed back towards the main entrance to get some shots there, unfortunately they must have stopped their lunch as I managed to get one photo before someone walked through the door. He didn't spot us at first, but as we were making our get away he called out to us. We decided it would be best to leave and try and come back a bit later when they had finished training.
We went away and got some food ourselves, did a bit of shopping to waste time then headed back later in the afternoon. It worked, they had all left and we had the place to ourselves. However with light fading we didn't have much time so it was a bit of a rush. Also managed to find the dentist suite which I missed before thanks to directions from @mookster
I snapped a quick shot of the entrance as we left.
We didn't get to see as much as we wanted. I'm hoping to do a return trip soon enough and cover the rest of the building as much as I can. Thanks for reading if you got this far!
More photos on my Flickr here: Whitchurch Hospital
Construction of Whitchurch Hospital began in 1898 and it was officially opened in 1908. Like most Victorian asylums it was designed to be fully self-sufficient with it's own farm, water and power supplies. During the Second World War part of the hospital was put under control of the military and it became the largest emergency hospital in South Wales. In 1948 it was taken over by the Ministry of Health as the NHS came into being and was fully utilised until care in the community systems beginning in the 1980s saw patient numbers begin to decrease. Phasing down of the hospital began in the mid 2000s with services beginning to move to new buildings elsewhere, and the hospital officially closed in April 2016.
The Explore
A massive thanks to @mookster for the tips for this one! Explored with @Balannah on a nice sunny day. We got into the buildings easily with no problems. However after about 10 minutes of exploring we soon realised we weren't the only ones in the building. We pressed on regardless, not knowing if it was security or anyone else inside with us. With multiple voices and footsteps around the main entrance and admin area we scurried off to the eastern wards and started our explore there.
After this we headed towards the water tower and climbed to the top to get some shots.
Whilst we were up there I had a look over towards the main entrance of the hospital and spotted two ambulances and an orange tent. On the bowling green were around 30 or so paramedics having lunch. They were using parts of the hospital for training, that put us at ease a bit more as to who was inside the building with us! Heading down we worked our way back towards the main hall.
From here we headed back towards the main entrance to get some shots there, unfortunately they must have stopped their lunch as I managed to get one photo before someone walked through the door. He didn't spot us at first, but as we were making our get away he called out to us. We decided it would be best to leave and try and come back a bit later when they had finished training.
We went away and got some food ourselves, did a bit of shopping to waste time then headed back later in the afternoon. It worked, they had all left and we had the place to ourselves. However with light fading we didn't have much time so it was a bit of a rush. Also managed to find the dentist suite which I missed before thanks to directions from @mookster
I snapped a quick shot of the entrance as we left.
We didn't get to see as much as we wanted. I'm hoping to do a return trip soon enough and cover the rest of the building as much as I can. Thanks for reading if you got this far!
More photos on my Flickr here: Whitchurch Hospital