The former Dilke Hospital site in the Forest of Dean has been sold to an education provider. The sale completed on 31 March 2026, after the site was placed on the market following the hospital’s closure in 2024.
Kevin Adams, Associate Director of Estates for Gloucestershire Health and Care NHS Foundation Trust, said:
“The Dilke is a valued community asset with a proud history of supporting people in the Forest of Dean for more than a century.
“When the site was vacated and we built the new Forest of Dean Community Hospital, it was important to us not only to achieve best financial value in support of local health services, but also to secure social value. The organisation which has purchased the site intends to use it for education, social and wellbeing purposes. We look forward to seeing what they do with the site and wish them well as the new owners.”
The new owners – Gloucestershire Independent College – will issue a further statement in due course setting out its vision in more detail. That vision includes ambitions to create a high-quality educational setting for young people aged 14-25 on the autism spectrum, with complex needs and multi-learning disabilities. Alongside the day college, the ambition is to create a partnership that will see the realisation of a therapeutic unit and a health and wellbeing centre that will support not only students, but also the wider community.
The intention is to develop the site in a way that reflects both its history and its future potential as a place of learning, support, therapeutic care and community connection.
The College sees an opportunity to create a setting that combines specialist education with wider wellbeing services, helping the site continue its long-standing contribution to the people of the Forest of Dean.
