Oblique aerial view centred on the hospital and offices, taken from the SE.

Description Oblique aerial view centred on the hospital and offices, taken from the SE.

Date 1/5/2001

Collection RCAHMS Aerial Photography

Catalogue Number D 76930 CN

Category Photographs and Off-line Digital Images

Copies SC 755748, SC 1688973

Scope and Content Aerial view of Royal Dundee Liff Hospital, Dundee This splendid pink sandstone hospital building, complete with circular towers and tall, crowstepped gables, was based on a symmetrical plan, with an advanced, three-storeyed, three-bayed centrepiece with a tall ground floor. Two-storeyed ward wings stretch out on either side, providing accommodation for male patients on one side and female patients on the other. The long south-facing front looks out over gardens and sloping terraces to the farmland beyond. One of the inner courtyards to the rear contains a service block with a tapering red brick chimney, painted black at its head, which rises from the boiler house. Gowrie House (right), a large, elaborate E-plan villa designed for private patients, lies within its own secluded grounds and almost hidden from view from the main hospital. Dundee Royal Lunatic Asylum, one of seven royal asylums to be built in Scotland between 1780 and 1840, opened in 1812. The asylum soon became overcrowded, and the problem of accommodating the growing number of pauper lunatics became acute until the building of the new Royal Dundee Liff Hospital provided the necessary extra accommodation. The new hospital was also designed with a separate section for private patients, but owing to serious financial difficulties the building of this section was postponed. The hospital, therefore, had to accommodate all classes of patients, with half the accommodation for paupers given over to private patients, and the recreation hall partitioned off to provide extra dormitory space. Eventually, in 1898, Thomas S Robertson produced plans for the delayed private patient block which opened in 1901. Royal Dundee Liff Hospital, a huge, imposing Baronial-style hospital designed in 1877-82 by the Dundee firm of architects, Charles Edward & Thomas S Robertson, was built to replace the Royal Lunatic Asylum in Dundee. It was generally known as West Green Asylum after its location, and, although designed as a pauper asylum, opened with accommodation for both pauper and private patients. In 1898 Thomas S Robertson designed a magnificent, self-contained building for private patients, which opened in 1901. Source: RCAHMS contribution to SCRAN.

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