Birmingham and Midland Eye Hospital - corner of Church Street and Barwick Street

Opened in 1883 to accomodate the hospital’s move from Cannon Street in 1823, the building – designed by Payne & Talbot – is fortunately still standing and is a prime example of Victorian Architecture as can be seen above.

As with the other City Centre hospitals – the building was insufficient to cope with today’s demands of a hi-tch hospital and a move to more centralized, multi-disciplinary hospital sites (and now ‘Super Hospitals’) swept in during the 1970s and gathered pace during the 1980s and 90s;  the days were numbered for the specialist hospital. Along with the Birmingham and Midland Ear, Nose & Throat Hospital a few hundred yards away and the Birmingham and Midland Hospital for Skin and Urinary Diseases, the hospital’s function moved to Dudley Road ‘City’ Hospital and the building was vacated by the NHS.

In 2000 the vacant building underwent a major refurbishment and opened as the 600-room Hotel du Vin – a ’boutique hotel’ (no, I’m not certain what that is either) and the long-term future of this impressive Victorian building has thus been assured.

Birmingham Ear and Throat Hospital - Edmund Street

Opening in 1891, the  Birmingham & Midland Ear, Nose & Throat Hospital in Edmund Street is one of a handful of what we would now call ’sepcialist’ hospitals that were constructed around the City Centre during the 19th Century.  Designed by Jethro Cossins and F. B. Peacock, the building today cuts an impressive figure as can be seen above.

The hospital closed in 1989 with a move to concentrate all medical treatment into a small number of large hospitals in the suburbs – Queen Elizabeth, East Birmingham etc.

I remember going there myself for some allergy testing in 1976 and it was incredibly antiquated then and a warren of tiny, high ceiling rooms:  I don’t whether or not their wards were operational at that time – or if indeed they took in-patients at that time, or whether, as it seemed, they just ran a series of clinics and day-patient procedures:  any further information would be greatly appreciated.

Whilst an impressive building, its interior was far from suited to being a modern hospital and accommodating the equipment and data systems needed for treatments today, not least due to its fairly restrictive size.

It is good to see that the building now enjoys Grade II listing status so will hopefully be around for many years to come albeit in a somewhat reduced form as it does now have a glass office edifice rising from the middle of it which, apparently, was designed to complement “beautifully the listed facade of [the] cherished building” – according to E.H.Smith who supplied the ceramic glazing tiles for the ‘One Eleven Edmund Street’ development within the facade of the hospital under the guidance of Glazzard Architects in 2001.

I, on the other hand, have a very different opinion of the ‘complementary’ nature of the construction . . .