272 



The Review of Reviews. 



September 1. 1906 



THE KING EDWARD VII. SANATORIUM. 



Much space in the June number of the Architec- 

 tural Rcvie-v is devoted to illustrations of this Sana- 

 torium at Midhurst, Sussex, which was opened by 

 the King last month, and to an interesting descrip- 

 tive article about it by the architect, Mr. H. Percy 

 Adams. The site has been most carefully chosen, 

 and the model sanatorium, built from the best of 

 the 180 essays and plans sent in by medical men, is 

 an advance on anything of the kind in England. 

 It was the Falkenstein Sanatorium, in Germany, 

 which is said to have suggested the idea to His 

 Majesty. 



The sanatorium stands at 494 feet above the sea, 

 with views over the South Downs, in open country-, 

 with plenty of pine woods and heather-covered 



ing is so situated as to have two distinct exits in 

 case of fire. The wood used seems mostly teak, 

 and the bedroom furniture is specially designed 

 with rounded comers inside and out. In the centre 

 are the hydropathic baths. The bedrooms have a 

 balcony nine feet wide in front of them, a part for 

 each patient being screened off. There is a " press- 

 button " lift of quite a new kind, which patients 

 themselves can easily work. The floors are all of 

 waxed teak, and the walls plastered and covered 

 with a kind of paper used in nearly all foreign 

 sanatoria, but never before in England. 



There is also a chapel, the gift of Sir John 

 Brickwood, of Portsmouth, built on a plan be- 

 lieved to be unique in buildings of the kind. It is 

 open-air, and V-shaped. 



Open fires are allowed in sitting-rooms, etc., be- 



\By co\irte9y of the " Architectural Revieic." 

 The King Edward VII. Sanatorium at Midhurst. 



moorland. It is needless to go into all that has 

 been done to insure the most perfect cleanliness, 

 the most up-to-date sanitation, and the maximum 

 of non-ahsorbentness — to coin a word. It goes 

 without saying that no pains have been spared. 

 The main building is in two distinct parts, one for 

 the administration and one for the patients, who 

 are of two classes, one of w'hich pays more and is 

 more luxurio\isly fed and housed than the other. 

 In the kitchen I notice that there is a steriliser for 

 the forks and spoons, and that the sinks are of 

 German silver, as preferable to porcelain. There 

 is, of course, a complete ice-making apparatus, and 

 a milk steriliser. There is a lounge, besides a num- 

 ber of sitting-rooms, and every room in the build- 



cause of their greater cheerfulness, though corri 

 dors and bedrooms and other parts are heated by 

 hot water. There is a complete installation of 

 electric bells, so that a patient can ring for a nurse 

 from his own room, and, if in bed, use a telephone 

 attachment to the bell, and thus speak direct to the 

 nurse. 



Many excellent views of the institution appear in 

 the Architectural Review, one of which we have re- 

 produced. 



Tb.e new Regent's Quadrant is described in the 

 Nineteenth Century attd After by Sir Aston Webb 

 as an illustration of improved shop architecture for 

 London. 



