A Block At North Staffordshire Hospital

A Block at North Staffordshire Hospital

This is a former workhouse school built in 1866, designed by Charles Lynam of Stoke on Trent. It now serves as hospital wards, offices and service rooms. The building was converted to old people's accommodation in the late 19th century and later converted to hospital wards in the 20th century. Various alterations and minor additions were made throughout the late 19th and 20th centuries.

The building is constructed of red brick with ashlar and blue brick dressings, and has Welsh slate roofs. It is built in the Renaissance Revival style and follows a symmetrical T-plan. The central administration and staff block is flanked by double-range classroom and dormitory blocks. At the rear, a spinal range contains the dining room, infants' schoolrooms, dayroom and dining room. Service buildings, mostly single storey, are positioned on the south side of the spinal range.

The front range rises to 2 and 3 storeys plus basements and extends 9 bays, then 3 bays, then 9 bays. It features a plinth, sill band, buttresses between bays, and shouldered coped gables. The windows are mainly stone cross-mullioned, many retaining their original margin-pane glazing. A projecting centre piece contains a moulded Tudor arched entrance with glazed screens and double doors. Above this is a sculpted coat of arms flanked by cross casements, and above again is a 4-light window. The side bays feature canted 2-storey bay windows with 4-light windows above, and single lights in the gables above. The flanking ranges have regular fenestration with variations reflecting the original room uses. Ground floor windows have blue brick relieving arches. The right range has a square flat roofed porch of around 1940 in the eighth bay, later altered to a bay window.

The double gabled returns have external stacks and fenestration similar to the main front. At the rear of the side ranges are former cloisters divided by buttresses with Tudor arched openings and blue brick heads, now infilled and fitted with plain sashes. Above, each bay has 12/12 glazing bar sashes. At the junction of the centrepiece with the spinal range are semicircular corner stair turrets with 12/12 glazing bar sashes on the lower floors and corbelled projections above with small glazing bar windows.

The spinal range is 2 storeys plus basements and 5 bays in extent. It is linked to the centrepiece by a single-bay corridor of 2 storeys. Openings, divided by buttresses, are blocked and modified on the basement and ground floor levels, though the first floor mainly retains original 12/12 sashes. At the east end of the spinal range is a former infants' day room, single storey, with buttresses. On the north side are 2 large through-eaves dormers with cross-mullioned windows. The east gable has symmetrical fenestration in the same style. The service range to the north is 2 storeys with plain fenestration. The service ranges to the south are single storey in L-plan with plain sashes.

Interior features include a central entrance hall with chamfered Tudor arched openings on each side. The stair turrets contain open well stone stairs with iron stick balusters. The basement has brick groin vaults and retains a large late 19th century cooking range. On the first floor, a wooden stair to the attics has stick balusters and a ramped handrail. The attics feature chamfered Tudor cross-arches and unusual strutted roof trusses. The side ranges have ground floor arch braces to cross beams and various 20th century partitions. On the first floor are arch braces, corbels and wall shafts to the principal rafter roof. This floor, formerly dormitories, now has 20th century partitions and a suspended ceiling. The spinal range has on the first floor an arch braced roof carried on central chamfered wooden posts, with a 20th century suspended ceiling.

Workhouse schools segregated children from adult paupers with the aim of educating them into socially desirable habits and removing them from poverty. They represented a major development in social policy. Stoke on Trent had one of the earliest such schools, and Block A was an extension and development of the service it provided. This scheme was not universally adopted in all workhouses, and surviving examples of such school buildings are rare.