Wolverhampton Eye Hospital
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Wolverhampton Eye Hospital was established in June 1881 but actually opened in 1888 at a cost of £3000.00. Built from designs by Mr T. H. Flemming the building was made up of an irregular shape with simple gothic styles and two spired turrets. When officially opened it had three wards for men and three for women with thirty five beds and five childrens cots.
The hospital was a specialist centre and dealt specifically with eye patients and served a population of around 350,000 people around the Wolverhampton and Midlands area, until it closed sometime in 2006 and facilities transferred to the more modern and up to date New Cross Hospital.
We actually discovered this place by chance back in late December 2007 whilst exploring the now demolished Wolverhampton Royal Infirmary near by and simply forgot about the place as back then access was not possible. Fast forward a year to the day almost and Jaff and myself found our way back to Wolverhampton to see if the place was explorable.
Sadly the place is not in the condition it was when we first saw it, and looks to have been ravaged by vandals and thieves. There was however still some interesting features still in one piece and a few old patient records left scattered around dating from the 50s right up until when the hospital closed.
The one thing we didnt expect to see though was a chapel? In a normal hospital you would expect to come across one but in a specialist eye hospital? A first for us anyway.
Inside is a labyrinth of corridors and connecting rooms which can prove disorientating as we found out, half an hour later wandering round various corridors and up a spiral staircase we ended back right where we started!
And interesting place this one even if a little odd and mismatched in some places. Pity it has been smashed to pieces as there would of been some rather good little features in here.
Just a shame really we didnt get to see this place in its full glory late last year as from what we seen then the place looked immaculate in every way unlike its present state today.
No doubt within the next few coming months the place will be vandalized even more and most propably get sealed tight with security on site 24 hours a day, then again we could be wrong?
The one interesting find we did come across was the photographs of the original founding members of the hospital. Sadly with the frames smashed , still and interesting little find.
An interesting site but nothing special.
