St Lukes Hosptial, Huddersfield

Sad to see the Victorian centre piece of St Lukes Hospital in Huddersfield being demolished recently;

Formally Crossland Moor workhouse, this important piece of social history stood in the way of a ripe piece of brownfield land and so has been leveled. I’m sure there wouldnt be any difficultly in incorperating this robust building into a new housing/ mixed use masterplan but a clean 22 acres is much more conducive to a real estate spreadsheet.

As far as I can tell, the new masterplan doesn’t even use the footprint of this building;

Th problems are systemic rather than practical. Investment, design, planning, and marketing for new build housing estates demands homogeneity and simplicity. An esoteric Victorian building just gets in the way. Shameful.