My Favourite Building: The former Nicholls Hospital in Ardwick

Andrew Darke, managing director for property at Warrington healthcare developer Assura Group, discusses his passion for the former Nicholls Hospital in Ardwick, Manchester.

What’s your favourite building?

The former Nicholls Hospital – now the Nicholls Campus of the Manchester College – in Ardwick.

When was it built?

The hospital was designed by Thomas Worthington and built in 1879. Ardwick was one of the many areas of Manchester that experienced a surge of development during the industrial revolution, and the formidable building is a relic of this period of industrial progress during the last quarter of the nineteenth century.

What was its original function?

Alderman Benjamin Nicholls founded Nicholls Hospital and named it after his son, John Ashton Nicholls, who died in 1859. A plaque in the entrance to the building describes how the hospital was intended to be a memorial for a son that ‘had the improvement of the humbler classes deeply at heart’, and to continue John’s legacy in continuing to care for people of the community after his death.

What is the style of architecture?

The college is a neo-gothic building. This style can be recognised in Worthington’s other works around Manchester, such as the Albert Memorial Hall and Minshull Street law courts.

What do you like about it? How is it used?

I admire the Nicholls Building for both its splendour and its symmetry, as it succeeds in being both a practical building and a thing of beauty. I also appreciate the way in which it has developed and adapted to meet the demands of the society of the time. In its 134 years as a Manchester landmark the Nicholls building has been a hospital, a school and is now part of a sixth-form college. Long after many other buildings have reached the end of their useful lives, the beauty of the Nicholls Building has endured and remains a monument in a city that is constantly changing and reinventing itself.