The year, 'MDCCCCV' (1905) is shown in
the pediment above the main entrance in Gower Street.
The building is Grade II listed and its entry at the English
Heritage website [visit
link] tells us:
"Hospital block. 1897-1906. By Alfred and Paul Waterhouse.
Red brick with terracotta horizontal bands and dressings. Steeply pitched slated
roofs with dormers. Cross-shaped plan set diagonally to Gower Street.
EXTERIOR: 4 main storeys, attics and basements. Central
entrance lodge; 3 bays, 2 storeys and attic with terracotta bands and rounded
angles. Round-arched ground floor openings. Central entrance flanked by columns
supporting an entablature with parapet and ball finials. Segmental arched 1st
floor sashes separated by pilasters supporting a projecting dentil cornice and
pediment over the central bays. Pediment flanked by full size sash window
dormers in steep mansard roof. Main buildings with central staircase projection
with 3 lancet windows and steep pointed roof behind which a bell tower with
spire. To either side, tall chimney-stacks and pots. Diagonally from this
feature, wings with projecting 2-window, pedimented bays. Main range of windows
with enriched surrounds and pierced decorative grilles to aprons. Wings
terminate with a bay of balconies to each floor and 3-window rectangular towers,
with dormers corbelled at the angles, and surmounted by pointed roofs with
rectangular, louvred features. Main cornice at attic level.
INTERIOR: not inspected.
SUBSIDIARY FEATURES: attached cast-iron railings with
parapet wall behind area basement blocks.
HISTORICAL NOTE: important as the first reaction against
Florence Nightingale's long-pervasive pavilion planning, and the first
importation of American ideas on 'towers of healing' for city sites."
The building is now a part of University College London and
houses the Wolfson Institute for Biological Research. The Wolfson website [visit link]
gives more detail about the building:
"The Cruciform building was designed in 1896 by the
English architect Alfred Waterhouse RA (1830-1905) as a replacement building for
the earlier University College Hospital on the Gower Street site. Waterhouse,
who was particularly associated with the Victorian gothic revival, designed and
built over 30 buildings, including Manchester Town Hall and the Natural History
Museum. University College Hospital was his last major commission and it was
formally opened in 1906, one year after his death.
Hospital planning of the late Victorian era generally
took the form of separate ward pavilions linked by long corridors. Space between
the wards allowed for sunlight, fresh air and ventilation, which were all
thought to contribute to patients' well-being. The Cruciform's bold diagonal
plan, with a single service core and radiating wings, maintained the virtues of
light and ventilation but limited horizontal circulation by stacking the wards
in four storeys on a podium containing the support facilities. Each wing was
built and opened separately, at a final construction cost of
£200,000.
Waterhouse’s great skill was in planning, particularly
on constricted urban sites. He selected his materials for their proven
durability; hard red brick and terracotta dressings in red and earth tones were
more economic and less susceptible to erosion in polluted Victorian cities than
stone. Practical, hardwearing and easily-cleaned materials were used internally
- terrazzo, mosaic and wood block for the floors and glazed bricks for the
walls, with marble for the formal outpatients' entrance.
The hospital closed in 1995 and was purchased by
University College London. It has been subject to a complete refurbishment to
give the building a new lease of life as the Wolfson Institute for Biomedical
Research and the pre-clinical teaching facility for the University College
London Medical School. As the building is listed Grade II by English Heritage,
the refurbishment sought to remove some of the post-Waterhouse extensions to
reveal the heavy cornice from ground level. Other extensions were re-clad with
sympathetic materials. A new block was built in the service yard for boiler and
chiller plant and a new lecture theatre was constructed in the basement between
two wings, with its roof hidden behind the parapet wall. Thorough cleaning and
remedial work were undertaken to all the brickwork and terracotta, although this
was in remarkably good condition for its age. The building was re-roofed and
external plumbing was removed.
Internally the layout proved adaptable to its new
functions. Over the years as a hospital the original arcades of the central
circulation area were infilled, the glazed brickwork was plastered over and the
floors covered in vinyl. As part of the refurbishment, as many of these original
features as are compatible with the new usage have been uncovered and restored.
This restoration work has brought light into the core area and given an
increased spatial awareness."