Holloway Sanatorium - Site: Virginia Water

Site: Virginia Water

In Victorian times many hospitals were built on spacious grounds in urban as well as rural locations, not only because more land was available, but also because space had therapeutic and practical value: "An asylum should be placed on elevated ground and should command cheerful prospects, should be surrounded with land sufficient to afford outdoor employment for males, and exercise for all patients, and to protect them from being overlooked or disturbed by strangers." This was the view of the Commissioners in Lunacy, quoted by an architecture researcher from York University, Robert Mayo, in a report for the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors.

A site was chosen, north of the town of Virginia Water, high on St. Ann’s Heath, part of his own land. Holloway wanted the Sanatorium to be visible from a railway: it certainly was, between Stoude Road and the straight northbound track from Virginia Water railway station. Work on the building began in the Spring of 1873, when a clerk of works was appointed. Holloway’s wife, Jane, laid the first brick. Crossland received his first commission payment of £300 on 2 March 1874. Once started, Holloway was determined that building should go forward apace. When his plan for the use of Portland stone in place of ornamental brickwork was not allowed to stand, Crossland had to set aside all his carefully planned working and detail drawings and hurriedly draw up alternatives as they were required by the masons.