Lying In Hospital - For Sale

Just walked by the Lying In Hospital where I was born and noticed the for sale sign. It has only recently been refurbished and restored by the St Thomas'. Feel rather sad as the houses next to it were demolished to make way for the Euro Star Terminal and now we have the new Aparthotel. I am a local lass and remember when the island block was just a green roundabout, the hospital had yet to be rebuilt. The South Bank was the site for the Festival of Britain and no one wanted to live there. I lived opposite the hospital in the Stangate Buildings which was demolished and the building which is now Ernst & Young was built.York House and The Florence Nightingale Public House are to be demolished and yet another glass building is to be built. I now live in what is to become Founders Place which I am sure will be wonderful developement(I can't wait to have central heating)once the issues of the trees are sorted.My how life has changed in my little space of SE1

Hi Ros.

This one surprised me as well. I remember the early (Frogmore?) planning application for the
island site, and all the kerfuffle which included, as I remember, the resignation of the then Council Leader.

I remember very specifically Hospital concerns about those proposals because the building on the part of the site next to Eurostar was configured in such a way that would prevent ambulance access to the rear of the Lying In Hospital, and thus preclude it for future medical use. These arguments seemed to carry a lot of weight, and the application was turned down.

If I also remember right, I was told that Frogmore had owned the freehold on the Lying In hospital and thus were able to stymy the Hospital, which was why the building got into such a state of disrepair.

So I was pleased to see it being done up and thought it was all sorted.

So interesting to know why the hospital are now selling.

(Even more interesting if it were related to the cost of aquiring the protected "Holy Trinity Centre" building which now forms part of the Founders Place site.)

I've been meaning to follow this one up. Does anyone know who the agents are? I keep forgetting to go and look at the sign when I am in the area.

James

The sign said Drivas Jonas

Thanks - that's very helpful. Here are the details on their site for those who are interested:
http://www.driversjonas.com/uk.aspx?doc=19798

I love this building, as it tries to lend dignity to the new "Forum Magnum Square" on the other side of York Road.

There's a Georgian-looking inscription recording "the patronage of Her Majesty and the Princess of Wales". Can anyone work out which Queen and Princess of Wales that would have been?

There's some history here:

'York Road', Survey of London: volume 23: Lambeth: South Bank and Vauxhall (1951), pp. 40-4.
http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.asp?compid=47036#s11

Would make a great location for the Ronald McDonald place.......

There is more history at:
'Lambeth: Waterloo Road' in, Old and New London: Volume 6 (1878), pp. 407-25

I particularly liked the tone of this bit:

Thornbury & Walford wrote:

The hospital was principally intended as an asylum "for the wives of poor industrious tradesmen and distressed housekeepers, who, either from unavoidable misfortunes, or from the burden of large families, are reduced to want, and rendered incapable of bearing the expenses incident to the lying-in state, and also for the wives of indigent soldiers and seamen; but the governors, in the spirit of true philanthropy, have extended the benefits of the institution to unmarried females, restricting this indulgence, however, to the first instance of misconduct.

Does this suggest some rethink in either the Trust of Charitable Foundation's overall accommodation strategy?

I have to admit I was pleasantly surprised when the Trust refurbished the GLI and moved the procurement, training and IT training functions into the building a few years ago. I'd (cynically?) assumed that the Charity Trustees were hoping it would fall down, so that they could get a redevelopment of the whole of their York Road site on the same scale as the County Hall blocks.

The interior refurbishment is very sympathetically done - they've even kept all the late Victorian ward tiling where this still existed. Will English Heritage allow major changes after such an exemplary restoration?