Hellingly Asylum occupies an extremely special place in my heart. Just over nine years ago it was the first place I ever explored and I, like many who had gone before me, instantly loved the place. Despite how utterly and totally ruined the asylum was, there was just something about it that everyone seemed to love. Maybe it was that it was one of only a few examples of asylums that were never really swallowed up in an urban sprawl during their lifetime and it's location outside a tiny village offered it total peace and serenity. Or maybe it was that there was largely never any security there so explorers had free reign over a huge asylum. Plus it had 'that' hall, the beautiful, iconic symbol which stood defiant until the very end, shrugging off so many efforts to burn it down and turn it into just another asylum with a lost hall like Severalls, Denbigh, West Park, Cane Hill etc.
I was lucky enough to visit the main body of Hellingly twice in 2009 - once before, and once just after demolition had begun. I always wished I could have visited it more but during that summer of 2009 it was West Park that took all my attention as well as the attention of most explorers who were around back then! Hellingly Asylum was almost completely demolished during 2010 and a new housing estate is built in it's place, even the water tower couldn't be saved. But then back in the summer of 2015 I saw a couple of photos from some buildings on the very edge of the asylum that had been spared demolition for whatever reason. The cluster of buildings included one which had remained open until 2010 as an admin office of sorts, and a couple that were proper vintage 1994 Hellingly closure. I knew I had to go back one last time and see them, and I'm so glad I did as the memories and feelings that came flooding back when I found myself stood inside bits of the asylum again were as unforgettable as that first step I took into Hellingly six years previous. We only got into two of the three buildings but I left feeling very happy.
I'm actually not sure what the status of these buildings is now, they could still be there but they probably aren't.
And on into the building that closed along with the majority of the asylum in 1994. This is where the memories and feelings really came back for me. It was like being transported back to my very first explore.
Lastly it really wouldn't have been true Hellingly without a carpet draped over the beams from a collapsed floor.
Thanks for looking
I was lucky enough to visit the main body of Hellingly twice in 2009 - once before, and once just after demolition had begun. I always wished I could have visited it more but during that summer of 2009 it was West Park that took all my attention as well as the attention of most explorers who were around back then! Hellingly Asylum was almost completely demolished during 2010 and a new housing estate is built in it's place, even the water tower couldn't be saved. But then back in the summer of 2015 I saw a couple of photos from some buildings on the very edge of the asylum that had been spared demolition for whatever reason. The cluster of buildings included one which had remained open until 2010 as an admin office of sorts, and a couple that were proper vintage 1994 Hellingly closure. I knew I had to go back one last time and see them, and I'm so glad I did as the memories and feelings that came flooding back when I found myself stood inside bits of the asylum again were as unforgettable as that first step I took into Hellingly six years previous. We only got into two of the three buildings but I left feeling very happy.
I'm actually not sure what the status of these buildings is now, they could still be there but they probably aren't.
And on into the building that closed along with the majority of the asylum in 1994. This is where the memories and feelings really came back for me. It was like being transported back to my very first explore.
Lastly it really wouldn't have been true Hellingly without a carpet draped over the beams from a collapsed floor.
Thanks for looking
