Former Holloway Sanatorium at Virginia Water
Former Holloway Sanatorium at Virginia Water, Stroud Road
Listed on the National Heritage List for England. Search over 400,000 listed places
Overview
- Heritage Category:
- Listed Building
- Grade:
- I
- List Entry Number:
- 1189632
- Date first listed:
- 17-Nov-1986
- List Entry Name:
- Former Holloway Sanatorium at Virginia Water
- Statutory Address:
- Former Holloway Sanatorium at Virginia Water, Stroud Road
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Location
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Images of England Project
- Date:
- 1999-11-03
- Reference:
- IOE01/02013/24
- Rights:
- © Mrs M.A.C. Ball. Source: Historic England Archive
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Discover moreOfficial list entry
- Heritage Category:
- Listed Building
- Grade:
- I
- List Entry Number:
- 1189632
- Date first listed:
- 17-Nov-1986
- Date of most recent amendment:
- 05-Mar-1998
- List Entry Name:
- Former Holloway Sanatorium at Virginia Water
- Statutory Address 1:
- Former Holloway Sanatorium at Virginia Water, Stroud Road
The scope of legal protection for listed buildings
This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.
Unless the List entry states otherwise, it includes both the structure itself and any object or structure fixed to it (whether inside or outside) as well as any object or structure within the curtilage of the building.
For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.
The scope of legal protection for listed buildings
This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.
Unless the List entry states otherwise, it includes both the structure itself and any object or structure fixed to it (whether inside or outside) as well as any object or structure within the curtilage of the building.
For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.
Location
- Statutory Address:
- Former Holloway Sanatorium at Virginia Water, Stroud Road
The building or site itself may lie within the boundary of more than one authority.
- County:
- Surrey
- District:
- Runnymede (District Authority)
- Parish:
- Non Civil Parish
- National Grid Reference:
- TQ0026168262
Details
This list entry was subject to a Minor Amendment on 4 July 2025 to amend the language in the description and to reformat the text to current standards
TQ 06 NW
1346/4/116
EGHAM
STROUD ROAD
Former Holloway Sanatorium at Virginia Water
17.11.86
GV
I
Former Sanatorium for private patients with mental conditions, now housing with communal amenity area for the residents. Built in 1873-85 to the designs of W H Crossland for Thomas Holloway, purveyor of patent medicines turned philanthropist.
Main building by W.H Crossland of red brick with Portland stone dressings and slate roofs. Almost symmetrical facade with what were originally private bedrooms and day areas on four storeys for private patients, male and female, converted in 1995-96 to houses. These set either side of central entrance with great hall over and former dining room, now pool, set to rear. Long front and wings punctuated with crow-steeped gables and bay windows; projecting centre of two storeys with open arcading on ground floor, main hall above with traceried windows and pinnacles at corners. Tall tower behind centre block with ornamental top stage, tracery opening and corner pinnacles, surmounted by a pyramidal roof and fleche. Wings return at both ends of fronts in similar style but have been curtailed. Many extensions at rear, now greatly reduced in extent and remodelled in 1995-96.
INTERIOR: entrance hall with stencilled decoration on walls and ceiling and three Gothic arches in front of staircase and corridors. Fine stone main stair branching into two with stencilled decoration on walls and balustrade and traceried windows with ornamental glass by Cottier and Co. Recreation hall on first floor with traceried windows and dais at one end, all sumptuously decorated. Hammerbeam roof and linenfold wall panelling with stencilling, glass in two-light traceried windows by Cottier and Co., walls painted with various figure scenes and, above timber dado, portraits on canvas by Ernest Girardot and others of various notables including Queen Victoria, Thomas and Jane Holloway, George Martin-Holloway and Henry Driver (many damaged and replaced).
On ground floor behind staircase, former dining hall with hammerbeam roof and stencilled decoration to walls and ceiling above dado level; the pastoral scenes painted on canvas by James Imrie and South Kensington students above dado level mostly lost. The stencilled decoration in the halls and on the staircase predominantly by J Moyr Smith, 1877-78. Other rooms in the main building simple, the interior much replanned by Charles Dorman, 1884-85. Later additions by R Weir Schultz and others mostly lost.
The Holloway Sanatorium was the most elaborate and impressive Victorian lunatic asylum in England, because it was the most lavish to be built for private patients, and it retains much of its original character and detailing. The quality of the external design and the decoration of the principal spaces is exceptional. It is the only example to be listed in grade I. It was paid for entirely by Thomas Holloway (1800-83) and his trustees, who also built the Royal Holloway College at Egham (1879-86) which survives nearby and is also grade I.
SOURCE: Victorian Society Annual, 1995
Listing NGR: TQ0026168262
Legacy
The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.
- Legacy System number:
- 289749
- Legacy System:
- LBS
Sources
Books and journals
Victorian Society Annual in Victorian Society Annual, (1995)
Legal
This building is listed under the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 as amended for its special architectural or historic interest.
Map
This map is for quick reference purposes only and may not be to scale. This copy shows the entry on 04-Jun-2026 at 05:51:11.
Download a full scale map (PDF)© Crown copyright [and database rights] 2026. OS AC0000815036. All rights reserved. Ordnance Survey Licence number 100024900.© British Crown and SeaZone Solutions Limited 2026. All rights reserved. Licence number 102006.006.
End of official list entry