Writer: Victoria Mesrobyan
Editor: Sophie Rogers
UCL’s Cruciform Teaching Labs: a space to spend three hours pipetting and trying your hardest to remember what Step Twelve of the protocol meant. However, right out in the open, only noticed by those who have waited forty-five minutes to process a gel electrophoresis, are a set of Royal Doulton tile paintings displaying a series of fairy tales. These tiles nod to a time when the Cruciform building was a hospital: when the very same teaching labs served as a children’s ward. Although they may seem like simple decoration, it was crisis that painted these fairytale tiles.
The early twentieth century was a pivotal period in the UK for advancements in understanding disease and public health. Led by social reformer Edwin Chadwick in collaboration with various scientists, the “Sanitary Awakening” linked poor sanitary conditions, overcrowding, inadequate water sanitation, and waste disposal to disease, using data to encourage parliamentary action. This awakening paved the way for successive Public Health Acts, which created and updated public health structures, laws, and administrative systems. The 1875 Public Health Act made it compulsory to provide fresh water, improve sewer systems and appoint medical officers, marking the beginnings of modern public health infrastructure and establishing a national standard.
Despite these advancements, inner cities were still subject to rapid urbanisation with overcrowding and poor sanitation persisting. These conditions were reflected in hospitals, which became an environment for both healing and the contraction of disease. Hospitals began using tiles around 1901 for their sanitary properties. They were valued for being non-porous, easily cleaned, and resistant to harbouring infection.
With children being a group of utmost concern, tiles were especially favoured in children’s wards. Most children at the time were malnourished and lacked acquired immunity, making the younger population particularly susceptible to parasitic and infectious diseases. These diseases included epidemics of diarrhoea, tuberculosis, diphtheria and scarlet fever, causing children under five years of age to make up nearly a third of annual deaths during this period.
With the foundations laid and serious problems identified, action followed. The appointment of a new Liberal government in 1906 created an opportunity for legislation to focus on specific populations: children, the sick, the elderly, and the unemployed. In addressing childhood disease, attention naturally turned to schools. Schools adopted free school dinners in 1906 to improve malnutrition, and the Education (Administrative Provisions) Act in 1907 instilled a School Medical Service, providing three compulsory medical inspections for primary students per year, with the goal of identifying problems early. Although there was limited treatment for issues found in the inspections, this represented a significant and popular step in public health.
With increased attention on child health and welfare, sanitation enabled art. Hospitals began commissioning artists for murals, focusing particularly on children’s wards, with the goal of adding colour and entertainment. Known for her murals with characteristic fairy motifs, Margaret E. Thomson was arguably at the forefront of this trend. She completed work for the Royal Victoria Infirmary, St Thomas’s Hospital and the former University College Hospital: now the Cruciform building.
Today, the Cruciform tiles, which previously brightened a children’s ward, remain on UCL’s walls as a testament to how public health reforms and scientific understanding can reshape cities.
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