40 PROJECT REPORT: HEALTHCARE BUILDINGS
rooms so that windows were located to “focus on the moments they will receive most of the sunlight.” Tenorio says that one of the key things that charity founder, designer Maggie Keswick Jencks, had in mind in her blueprint for the first centre, in Edinburgh, was avoiding the traditionally inadequate welcome that NHS facilities tend to give. Jencks died of cancer before its completion in 1996, but was only too aware of “exactly how unwelcoming and sterile hospitals were,” says Tenorio. He adds that her design maxim was that receiving a cancer diagnosis – which many visitors will have just endured prior to arriving – “shouldn’t be any harder than it already is.”
The form of these curving timber vessels echoes the centre’s role supporting and giving advice to cancer patients and their families
The idea for creating three forms came from the desire to place the counselling rooms “at the centre of the garden,” i.e. the extensively landscaped site. Topped by roof gardens, these ‘pods’ resemble large planters formed of curved and ribbed glulam, the one at the highest part of the site providing a protective canopy for the entrance. This, and the lowest pod, house full-height rooms, and the taller third volume is three storeys, and sits at the centre of the site. The CLT slab roofs overlap each other slightly, connected at high level by strips of glazing, letting light flood in and creating an appealingly organic terraced composition.
The form of these curving timber vessels echoes the centre’s role supporting and giving advice to cancer patients and their families. Says Tenorio, “It's something of an analogy for the strength that people need to gather to go through the process of cancer.” The lowest roof garden is viewable from the publicly accessible terrace, however all three are viewable from windows of surrounding wards, providing a new green outlook for many patients at ‘Jimmy’s’.
The remaining spaces created within the building, surrounding the pods, amount to one interconnected public circulation area – there are 23 spaces in total in this deceptively small 430 m2
building, all of
which have their own interior design treatment. The site gets a good amount of light in the morning and late afternoon, but is shaded by the car park in the middle of the day. This helped orient the counselling
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Although the spaces within are free flowing, the overall effect of the forms is to provide an embracing, comforting feel, enhanced internally by the three overlapping and canopy-like structures. The placing of the two entrances has been carefully considered, working with the landscape designer to create a “seamless and natural” entrance, while locating them “in the most protected way for people on site,” i.e. under roof canopies that will provide shelter on rainy days.
One entrance connects the existing hospital with the centre directly, and leads straight into the communal kitchen, “the building’s heart,” says Tenorio; the other comes into the circulation space. Benches are provided outside the entrances for patients who may wish to have a moment of private reflection before entering.
Interiors Once inside, the design is intended to intuitively guide the patients but also allow them to explore for themselves, and gain some agency at a very disorienting time. There is no reception desk – as per usual in Maggie’s Centres – but instead a variety of peaceful, bright areas to sit and read, or have a coffee around the kitchen table. Short runs of timber stairs connect the different mid levels; patients never need to ascend a full storey, but only mezzanine-like distances – helping them navigate the building, and also tackling the gradient.
The pod spaces were designed to feel deliberately ‘private,’ in contrast to the rest of the building, as “when people are having therapy they want to feel protected,” says Tenorio. The common areas have tall windows, giving a visual connection to the landscaping, enhancing the activities provided here such as group therapy and yoga, as well as sitting and having a
ADF JANUARY 2021
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