School constructed on the site of the former Springwell Lane workhouse. The special school is located within the area of the former isolation hospital. The workhouse was designed by a J H Morton after winning a competition. It was opened in 1900 and claimed to be the most modern in England at the time. It consisted of a number of buildings including an infirmary, an isolation hospital, the lunacy building (?), entrance building and workhouse proper. It was taken over by the local authority in 1930 and functioned mainly as a maternity and geriatric hospital until it was demolished in 1974. Prior to this, the area was agricultural. The first edition OS map names it as part of 'Spital Field'. It is possible that the land formerly provided income for a hospital. Legibility of the former landscape is fragmentary as some boundaries of the 'Spital Field' have been fossilised.