Originally a dormitory, the Ann Baillie Building was designed by Kingston architect William Newlands to house 26 nursing students at the Kingston General Hospital's School of Nursing; its construction was supported by fundraising efforts by the Nurses Alumnae Association. While the first nursing students at Kingston General enrolled in 1886 and graduated in 1888 (the programme being lengthened to three years in 1905), originally nursing student accommodations were located within the hospital itself as quarters both overcrowded and at risk of contamination with infectious disease.