Broadmoor Hospital, Main Range including the Chapel/Hall (block 5), Dorset House

Broadmoor Hospital, Main Range including the Chapel/Hall (block 5) and Dorset House

A hospital for mentally disordered offenders built between 1858 and 1863, designed by Sir Joshua Jebb as the State Asylum to house all the Criminal Lunatics in England and Wales. The building received alterations and additions in 1886–88, 1891, 1900, 1913, and the late 20th century.

The Main Range is constructed of red brick with yellow brick arcading and bands, combined with Bath stone. The chapel and recreation hall are of yellow brick with red brick detailing. The roofs are slated hips with yellow brick Lombardic eaves cornices. The building is mostly three storeys high.

Windows are round-arched and mostly paired, some set in shallow round-arched recesses; many retain the original pivoted top ventilation panes. The former main entrance to the north features twin towers with arcaded openings and paired round-arched windows beneath a Lombardic cornice. A central archway contains two stages of blind arcading, the lower in polychrome brick and the upper in stone, flanking a large clock inscribed "Dent" and "London" and topped with an apron of carved stone foliage. The entrance opens into a cloistered courtyard. The courtyard facade of the entrance block displays four arcaded windows above the arch and a similar clock set in a pediment. Bays on either side have paired round-arched windows, those at ground floor set in shallow round-arched recesses. The north facade is in similar style with a four-storey tower topped by an arcaded storey. The south facade has a symmetrical design with projecting end bays and staggered projecting inner bays.

The central recreation hall with chapel above features a double-height canted bay and lower flanking bays, each with a blind oculus to each floor.

Interior: The building retains much of its original plan form although modernised. The recreation hall contains a stage and ornate cast iron columns supporting heavy beams of the chapel above. Two double-leaf entrances have doorcases reputedly carved in classical style by Richard Dadd. The chapel features exposed yellow brick with polychrome brick aisle arcading on cast iron columns, and a polychrome brick chancel arch. An open roof of timber trusses spans the chapel, with a western gallery.

Historical context: The principle of "criminal" insanity was first defined in 1723. Unless offenders could afford private asylum care, county gaols were their only place of detention. Two blocks for "criminal lunatics" were built at Bethlehem Hospital in 1816, but not until 1860, following an Act "to make better provision for the custody and care of Criminal Lunatics" passed after a campaign led by the Earl of Shaftesbury, was effective action taken. Broadmoor opened in May 1863 under Home Office management. Although Jebb had designed Pentonville model prison twenty years earlier, his Broadmoor design was much closer to contemporary county lunatic asylums, reflecting attitudes towards the 500 male and female patients. Among the first patients transferred from Bethlehem Hospital was the painter Richard Dadd, whose insanity had caused him to murder his father, but who was able to continue painting pictures of considerable quality.

Late 20th-century additions to the rear are not of special interest.