Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!

A walk around St Ann’s hospital

I’ve lived here for years & until the last few days had never visited the St Ann’s hospital site. If you’ve never been before, you MUST go!! Turn right as you go in the main entrance, which is much quieter - the site has several beautiful but derelict Victorian buildings, mid-century modern blocks & an incredible water tower. I’ve seen it from afar but didn’t realise it sat within the hospital grounds! There’s also this beautiful Victorian terraced/covered walkway, which seems to stretch on forever!

Aside from the fantastic architecture (we really do need to cherish these beautiful historic buildings, it seems we’re losing so many in the borough), there’s a couple of open lawned gardens & many, many trees & hedgerows. We don’t tend to have large expanses of mature hedgerows like this in the borough & they were teeming with garden/song birds. We visited at dusk & the sound of the birdsong was so loud & diverse!! This must be one of the largest & most undisturbed wildlife habitats (we saw no other walkers) in Haringey/North London. We saw 3 foxes too!

An absolute treat of a place, on our doorstep & with full public access, well worth a visit.

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Permalink Reply by Duguneek on February 22, 2021 at 12:12

Victor I don't think the NHS has sufficient staffing to run all these hospitals that are being closed for developers. Always possible to purchase local sub-lets such as Residents' Association Halls etc for Community hospital type work, vaccinations, ... NHS can work in a far more dynamic way wrt estates. As ever, staffing is the key to all of this. We need to grow our own doctors and nurses rapidly due to hostile environment measures of current government. Unfortunately I don't think the likes of Priti Patel really care.

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Permalink Reply by hhnrau on February 19, 2021 at 11:55

how many of the historic buildings are going to be preserved? I haven't been round the site but can't help thinking it would be a travesty to lose them, including the covered walkway mentioned in this thread, as they can help contribute a real sense of place

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Permalink Reply by Hugh on February 19, 2021 at 12:22

Good question. I found the following image on the Catalyst website which shows the 'heritage' assets they plan to keep. (see their page about the project).

Going clockwise from the top, by the main entrance, is the old gate lodge (right against the wall), then there's the building just to its east (which I think used to be the old 'receiving room'), then Mulberry House. Then circling right round to the southernmost building, we come to U-shaped Admin building (has some interesting rooms). Over to the west is the water tower. Then heading back towards the gate is the Edwardian nurses' block, with some fine lofty rooms retaining many of their original features. Finally Between that and the gate lodge is Mayfield House.

So they're retaining a good cluster of the oldest buildings. Many of the old ward blocks are unexceptional. But I hope they find an imaginative way to preserve the bricks of one the ward blocks which have graffiti from patients going back almost a hundred years.