In 2023 we set off on a road trip through Wales, with the aim of documenting the country’s former lunatic asylums. These institutions were commonly built towards the end of the 19th, and early 20th centuries, for councils to look after the mentally ill. Today most of the sites lie either ruined or boarded up…
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Whitchurch Hospital opened as the Cardiff City Mental Hospital with the medical superintendent, Dr Edwin Goodall, reluctant to refer to it as an asylum. Due to Cardiff’s rapidly growing population an asylum was needed ad in 1898 construction started on this £350,000 hospital, which opened its doors in 1908. Whitchurch was a large asylum which…
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Officially opened in January 1906, St Cadoc’s Hospital is one of few original asylum buildings which is still used today. Although the majority of the site is sitting unused, mental health services for children, adults and the elderly are still provided on site, including in some of the original wards. In 1891 Newport was constituted…
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Cfen Coed Hospital, in Swansea, is one of few original asylum buildings to still be in use today. It was also one of the last to be built following delays caused by the First World War which led to a shortage of materials and labour. Construction started in 1928 and the asylum was completed in…
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Talgarth is a small, quaint market town in mid-Wales and as of 2011 was home to less than 2,000 people. Driving through the narrow country roads you’ll eventually get to two large concrete gate posts – the original entrance to the former Mid Wales Hospital, known as Talgarth Asylum. Due to increasing demand on other…
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Seventeen miles west of Cardiff is the small village of St Athan’s, where this derelict village remains off of an unassuming country road. The idea for building a holiday camp first arose in 1923 when two philanthropists, co-founders of the Boys’ Clubs of Wales, visited a similar site in New Romney, Kent. The Boys’ Club…
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We have some exciting news to announce today. We are finally unveiling our upcoming Abandoned Wales video series, which will be starting next weekend and will run into the new year. The video below serves as an introduction to the five videos and the background behind how they came to be. Liam has been filming…
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