Royal Alexander Hospital.
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The Royal Alexander Hospital for sick children was the design of architect Thomas Lainson and was officially opened in 1881 by their Royal Highnesses the Prince and Princess of Wales.
Its history goes back further though, to 1868 when the original Brighton children’s hospital opened in a private house in Western Road, Brighton by Dr R.P.B.Taafe.
It expanded into an adjacent building in 1870, but in the same year the hospital moved to the disused ChurchHillSchool in Dyke Road where it was reopened with twenty beds on 14 July 1871 by the Bishop of Chichester.
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The present hospital building was erected on the site in 1880-1, a three-storey red-brick building which was opened on 21 July 1881 by Princess Alexandra.
Decorated with terracotta mouldings, it was designed in Queen Anne style by Thomas Lainson at a cost of £10,500. The girls' ward was named the Taafe Ward in honour of the founder.
A two-storey out-patient and isolation ward opened in 1904; the east wing was opened by the Duke and Duchess of York on 30 May 1928; and the Gillespie Wing was opened on 4 December 1945 by Princess Elizabeth.
The Princess also attended a concert at the Dome in aid of hospital funds. The Cawthorne Ward was converted in 1966 from the 1896 nurses' home. Since 1954 the patron has been the present Princess Alexandra.
In the ensuing years, the Alex as it was also known became arguably Brighton’s best-loved hospital.
It has a long history of progressive and innovative paediatric care embracing medicine, nursing, paediatric nurse training and research.
It finally closed sometime in 2007 after serving Brighton for over 120 years.
With the reputation of this place we did have visions of the hospital being rather big, sadly it wasn`t but that didnt in anyway reduce its appeal, inside is now rather trashed, between the builders and vandals its suffered in parts.
Despite this it does still retains its charm and theres still enough to see, the main feature throughout the hospital is the theme, obviously with it being a childrens hospital the walls and corridors are filled with bright colors and murals of every concievable cartoon character imagainable which does give a nice calm relaxed and cofortable feel.
A first for all of us exploring a derelcit childrens hospital but it was rather a relaxed explore.
Date : April 2008 : Location : Brighton : Explorers : Havoc : Lawrence : Jaff Fox : Mr Bones
