Powick Hospital, which opened in 1847 was a psychiatric facility located on outside the village of Powick, near Malvern, Worcestershire. At its peak, the hospital housed around 1,000 patients in buildings designed for 400. During the 1950s the hospital gained an internationally acclaimed reputation for its use of the drug LSD in psychotherapy pioneered and conducted by Ronald A. Sandison. In 1968 the institution was surrounded by controversy concerning serious neglect of patients. In 1989 it was closed down leaving Barnsley Hall Hospital in Bromsgrove as the remaining psychiatric hospital in the county. Most of the complex has been demolished to make way for a housing estate. History Origins Founded in 1847 as the Worcester County Pauper and Lunatic Asylum, it was designed by architects J. R. Hamilton and J. M. Medland of Gloucester and opened in August 1852. Situated between Worcester and Malvern on former farmland known as White Chimneys, the asylum was originally erected for the accommodation of 200 inmates but was later extended and by 1858 had 365 patients. Edward Elgar The doctors at the Asylum in the 1870s showed a remarkably enlightened attitude when they instituted a series of orchestral concerts there, as well as the Friday night dances for the inmates. Elgar, as a young violinist in the district played in the concerts from 1877, and in January 1879 succeeded Fred S. May in the post of Band Instructor. In 1879, at the age of 22, Elgar composed a number of works, the Powick Asylum Music, for the attendants' band. His job consisted of conducting the Asylum Band, made up of the staff of the Asylum, and composing music for the Friday dances. The authorities paid him £4 per annum less than his predecessor, no doubt because of his inexperience, but he received about £30 per year, plus 5 shillings for every polka and quadrille and one shilling and sixpence for accompaniments to the Christy's Minstrels ditties of the day. The last set of dances he composed in 1884. Research By the 1950s it had around 1,000 patients and major research and experimentation in the treatment of chronic depression and schizophrenia was being carried out. In 1952 during a trip to Switzerland and visiting Sandoz, the consultant psychiatrist at Powick, Ronald Sandison, came in contact with Albert Hofmann, who had discovered the hallucinogenic drug LSD by accident. He returned to the UK with 100 vials