Psychiatric Hospital (Asylum)

Santa Cruz de Tenerife · Category: Architecture · Subcategory: Civil architecture · Year: 1895-1947 · Authors: Antonio Pintor y Ocete, Domingo Pisaca Burgada

Until recently, the treatment of mental patients occupied a very secondary place in the already bleak healthcare landscape of the Island. Initially, patients were confined in certain rooms of the old hospitals, without any therapeutic purpose. The first building exclusively dedicated to psychiatric care in Santa Cruz began operating in 1881 and was located on San Telmo Street, but it must have been provisional, as two years later the patients were moved to another building annexed to the old Civil Hospital, under whose administration it depended.

It was the doctor and politician Juan Febles Campos who devoted himself to an active campaign aimed at achieving the creation of a place where mental patients could be in dignified sanitary conditions. In 1892, as Deputy Inspector of the Beneficial Establishments of the Province, Febles Campos founded an association for the construction of an asylum. The following year he had raised enough money to begin the works.

It was thought that the installation of a centre of these characteristics had to be located on the outskirts of the city. Initially, an attempt was made to situate it at Cruz de Ventoso, above Almeida, but finally the current location was chosen, with special interest in ensuring the place was pleasant and surrounded by vegetation.

The building was commissioned to the architect Antonio Pintor, who adopted the spatial distribution that was already standard in Europe for this type of healthcare complexes: systems of independent interconnected pavilions.

The works began at the beginning of 1895 and were delayed for several years due to their complexity and the persistent lack of funds. Nevertheless, before being handed over for the use for which it was conceived, the building, still unfinished, housed various needs: it accommodated troops returning from the Cuban war and years later, victims of the Chinyero volcano. It also opened its doors to infectious patients from various epidemics. 

Finally, in 1913 the first mental patients were admitted to the new hospital. In 1926 an extension was made to admit women, and in 1929, the architect Domingo Pisaca undertook a major expansion of the spaces. In 1947, again, a new reform and modernisation made it possible to accommodate up to 425 patients.

In subsequent years, the increase in population and changes in the field of psychiatry have required a notable effort to update the healthcare complex. Various buildings and spaces have been added recently to meet the demand of new renewed therapy systems. However, the original construction is still maintained and preserved.

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