Unite Student Accommodation Scheme in Bristol to Be Named After City’s First Black Hospital Ward Sister

Unite Students has announced its new property in Bristol will be named after Princess Campbell, the city’s first Black ward sister who helped lead the city’s fight against racial discrimination. 
Princess Campbell (1939-2015) was a pioneer who challenged prejudice in nursing and housing in the city after she arrived from Jamaica in 1962. She trained as a nurse and became the city's first black ward sister, working at Glenside Hospital in Fishponds, Bristol. She received an MBE for services to the community in 2011 having campaigned for Black people and disadvantaged communities. She was a founder member of the Bristol Black Archives Partnership. 
Campbell House is due to open in summer 2022, ahead of the start of the 2022/23 academic year. Work on site was paused during the early months of the Covid-19 pandemic, after planning permission was granted in February 2020, and restarted on-site in November 2020.  Unite Students is investing £45 million in the development and will be Unite’s 15th property in the city. 
The former Bristol Royal Infirmary building, which fronts onto Marlborough Street, and listed chapel building at the rear are both being retained and sensitively restored for residential and community use. 
Matthew Loughlin, Group Development Director at Unite Students, said in a statement: “Once complete, Campbell House will be the jewel in the crown of our properties in Bristol. The mixed-use development will create unique space, sensitively combining new with old, in a prime city centre location. We hope it will become a real asset for both the city of Bristol more widely and for the local community.”