Yesterday we visited Rauceby Asylum, a derelict set of buildings in Sleaford, Lincolnshire. I'd never been before and on our tour of urbex sites around Lincolnshire, this place was at the top of the "to do" list.
Rauceby Hospital, also known as Kesteven County Asylum, is a long since closed mental institution in Sleaford, Lincolnshire, England. Originally opened in 1902, I was surprised to find the hospital was only closed as recently as 1997. The site is still standing but there are signs of redevelopment.
It was also interesting to find that in 1940 the building was taken over by the Royal Air Force and renamed as No.4 RAF Hospital Rauceby. It became a crash and burns unit under the control of nearby RAF Cranwell. During its time as a burns unit, plastic surgery was pioneered here and burns victims emerged as members of the "Guinea Pig Club".
For this quick trip around the asylum, I took only my iPhone 14 Pro; the light was good and we were on a schedule so no tripod faffery this time:
Panorama
I didn't bother to take my "proper" camera and took along my iPhone 14 Pro with it's promise of super duper images. Here I used the panorama mode and whilst it looks fine on social media, having a 32" 4K monitor this image quality doesn't stand up too well...
Suspended flooring
Being an architectural "buff" I wasn't expecting to find what was left of old suspended flooring. In researching suspended floors, I found that most houses at the end of the Victorian period were built with suspended ground floors.
A typical suspended timber floor from about 1900 comprises a series of joists supported by external and internal loadbearing walls and covered with floorboards. To keep the construction costs down the timber joists were suspended between sleeper walls which you can see here down the centre of the room.
The Orangery
I'm presuming here that's what the staff here called this structure. It's basically a large greenhouse and will look epic when I return here later in the year to light it up in the dark!
And the view of the orangery looking the other way:
Sketchy
A wide angle view of one of the series of buildings around the site with it's suspended wooden floor missing. I'll be honest and say I didn't fancy walking inside here that much. Way too sketchy....
No Gable End Wall
I wandered in to one of the safer looking buildings and poked my camera around the corner to find the gable end wall was missing. The wooden floor here looked safe enough but I didn't chance it and stayed stood on lovely concrete floors!!
The Lucifer Effect
I often find in abandoned sites such as this, evidence of satanic rituals. I never know whether to take these whack jobs seriously. My assumption here is that someone has done a model shoot and added the graphics for effect. I know that if I'd turned up with a model to shoot, I'd have used this a backdrop myself....
Ghostly Perspective
I've faffing with Lightroom preset filters on my iPhone lately and this filter is appealing to me.
I also look at this corridor as a potential place to shoot in the dark, but I'm not sure how safe this bit is to walk along. I'm built for comfort, not for speed and I'm certain I'll break an ankle here!
And finally... AI
Like many others maybe, I've downloaded a Photoshop Beta with it's new AI Regenerative Fill features. I may have got carried away with the desriptive text... dramatic summer sky....
About me:
I don't like to be labelled as shooting one particular genre of photography but usually I specialise in shooting lightpainting images and occasionally dabble in urbex and artistic model photography.
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Awesome! Thank you for sharing!
Great explore Chris.
Cheers pal, wouldn't mind a revisit in the dark but a new housing estate full of curtain twitchers is next door....
Really interesting post
Thanks @georgxs :-)
Amazing article, fascinating shots and great place to #urbex!
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Thanks @jlinaresp :-)
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#POSH
There's hardly any asylums left. Ridge Lea in Lancaster is one I can think of.., that was one creepy place (I did solo). Looks like yours doesn't have a lot left.
Definitely not a lot of anything interesting to look at that's for sure. I look at this place as a location to shoot in the dark, except it don't get dark until late this time of year... We did try St.John's Asylum after this but that's very nearly completely redeveloped and what was still under construction was covered in CCTV.
Urk.. I hate reno's, they take away everything of interest.
@fastchrisuk It's surprising that this place has been abandoned for 26 years, yet the walls still seem sturdy. There aren't many signs of heavy decay in some details of the old building either. You had a unique and refreshing exploration.
Thanks @sophronia they literally don't make 'em like they used to! There are some signs of roof repairs to keep the buildings dry (ish) and I don't believe it will be long before they start to be developed.
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