Severalls Asylum June 2012

aquanuke · Jun 2, 2012

Went to visit Severalls asylum couple of days ago with Sparky on here and was stunned by how big this site is. Only got to explore a fraction of the site as it's just exhausting lugging my camera gear around and navigating the site. We skipped quite a few buildings as simply did not have time but was a really good day and a great experience.

A little history...

Severalls Hospital in Colchester, Essex, UK was a psychiatric hospital built in 1910 to the design of architect Frank Whitmore. It opened in May 1913.

The 300-acre (1.2 km2) site housed some 2000 patients and was based on the "Echelon plan" - a specific arrangement of wards, offices and services within easy reach of each other by a network of interconnecting corridors. This meant that staff were able to operate around the site without the need to go outside in bad weather. Unlike modern British hospitals, patients in Severalls were separated according to their gender. Villas were constructed around the main hospital building as accommodation blocks between 1910 and 1935. Most of the buildings are in the Queen Anne style, with few architectural embellishments, typical of the Edwardian period. The most ornate buildings are the Administration Building.

And apologies for my photos, my camera is still broken

I did take hundreds of photos and eventually I will put most of those on my Facebook page. If you wanted to see those please subscribe at http://www.facebook.com/aquanuke