Holloway Sanatorium

Holloway Sanatorium was an institution for the treatment of the insane on 22 acres (8.9 ha) of parkland near Virginia Water, Surrey, England within the boundary of Egham and today's contiguous London urban area, about 22 miles (35 km) south-west of Charing Cross.

It was conceived by the wealthy philanthropist Thomas Holloway, designed in an elaborate Franco-Gothic style by W. H. Crossland, and built between 1873 and 1885. It is a stunning building, particularly when seen from the M25 with its sister building, the Royal Holloway College; Sir Nikolaus Pevsner regarded these two buildings as the "summit of High Victorian design". In 1948 it was transferred to the National Health Service. In the year 2000, after a period in which it had been neglected, it became a gated housing development and was renamed Virginia Park with many of the original features preserved under the direction of English Heritage.

The site of Holloway Sanatorium is the present 'Virginia Park' development in Virginia Water, on the west side of Stroude Road and to the north of the railway station. It was one of two important symbols of the vision of the Victorian multi-millionaire entrepreneur and philanthropist, Thomas Holloway (1800–1883): the other being the nearby Royal Holloway College in Egham, Surrey (now Royal Holloway, University of London) which was opened two years later. Like the College, the Sanatorium was an extraordinary and extensive building, founded and personally funded by Holloway as a 'Gift to the Nation', and it was the fruit of the partnership between Holloway and his principal architect William Henry Crossland (1835–1908). The architecture was inspired by the gothic styles of the Cloth Hall of Ypres in Belgium with its conspicuous tower, and the Sainte-Chapelle in Paris.

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