Presenting two scenes, one from the 1940s and the other, 1932, showing two buildings connected to a sprawling mental health facility. We’re looking at West Lawn and Centre Lawn, at a place called Riverview Hospital (formerly Essondale). There out in Coquitlam British Columbia on the west coast. It’s a big complex and disused sections can be respectfully viewed by the public. The site has a bit of a creepy vibe, and the structures seen here have appeared in many horror films as a result.
The first image shows a view towards West Lawn Building (originally Male Chronic Building) and it’s the oldest structure in Riverview (built 1913). It’s been closed for some times now, but it and all the others here are watched over and kept up. The vegetation has grown up since the original capture and blocks the view from this angle, but everything is still there. The sidewalks, the stairs and the building itself. It’s hard to get a full shot of the latter, given all the growth.
This Then image is from the Royal BC Museum and for allowing use, we send our thanks.
The second image is not a direct angle and composition comparison, but still pretty close. We only found it after we shot there and remarkably it almost lined up exactly. This one shows a nurses’ graduating class of 1932 at the Centre Lawn Building (formerly Acute Psychopathic Unit). The structure is from 1924 and architecturally similar to West Lawn. Essondale/Riverview also functioned at as a training centre for nurses.
To know and see more about these two buildings, plus others in the Riverview complex, go here: Riverview Hospital Coquitlam BC.
This image comes from the the City of Coquitlam archives and once again, we’re appreciate it they allowed us use. There’s actually many more images in the two respective archives that we didn’t know of, and if we’re ever in the area again (fingers crossed), we’ll plan to shoot more comparisons there. We were unaware of many at the time of this visit (late 2023) and anyway with more it would have been overwhelming that pass. Now that we know the place, we relish the thought. This visit, we accompanied a couple friends, and had a grand time.
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