Building design
Wide, organically-shaped circulation spaces encourage movement, but offer a measure of privacy and ‘safe’ window seats.
and connections with the wider hospital site. External materials, forms, and overall heights, have been carefully matched to the surrounding buildings. The architecture has developed from the inside out due to the very specific needs of the patients. Due to the variety of different spaces created in the floorplan, and the different alignment of walls, the simple roof geometry has been used to provide a lid to all of that complexity. By creating a significant overhang the roof provides shelter from the rain and shading from the sun in the courtyards. The roofs provide a very legible form to the building – allowing patients, staff, and visitors, to orientate themselves easily once inside. The ‘fingers’ of accommodation are linked at their southern end by a band of shared spaces, interspersed with staff facilities. This front-of- house accommodation is organised to carefully protect the privacy of the patients, and allow the staff to work efficiently with minimal journeys around the facility. This attention to the environmental needs of such a sensitive patient group minimises any disturbance to the neighbouring patients in the hospital.
PURPOSEFUL INNOVATION An added complexity and challenge on this project was the fact that, to date, there has been no building in the UK specifically designed for this patient group, which meant that the project team had to develop design standards harnessing knowledge gained from visits to other residential buildings for autism patients, information from organisations such as the Autistic Society, and first-hand knowledge from the Trust’s clinicians. Numerous design workshops took place with staff to develop the brief and test designs. One of the key briefing decisions
There are eight single-person flats ‘for the most complex and challenging service- users’. The unit also incorporates two 2-person flats and one 3-person flat.
was to not future-proof the building for conversion to suit another service, as the autism design requirements were so specialised. Instead, the focus was on adaptation to individual patients’ needs. That said, there is enough commonality with other best-practice mental healthcare facilities to allow adaptation or conversion in the future. An adjoining fifth ‘finger’ could be added quite easily for expansion.
PATIENT FLATS
Extensive design development centred on the patient flats. The optimum size was developed through initial testing of the footprint, leading on to a full size mock-up being built. The mock- up started with simple spaces and became more and more refined, testing bespoke joinery and other detailed elements. Everything was tested for robustness, and particularly acoustic properties. The design allows all built-in features to be quickly concealed with integrated covers when stimulus reduction is needed.
DESIGN APPROACH Our design saw a range of internal and external shared areas provided, offering opportunity for sensory, therapy, and recreational activity. Design drivers include attention to the graduation from public to private space, addressing the vulnerability of each patient. The thresholds from each flat to the circulation space, and progress from there to shared therapy spaces, are all carefully considered to encourage the patient and avoid conflicts with fellow service-users. Wide, organically-shaped circulation spaces encourage movement, but offer a measure of privacy and ‘safe’ window seats. From the various stakeholder workshops and
A recent visitor commented: “The design is innovative, forward-thinking, cutting edge, and sets the standard.”
research undertaken, the following key design drivers emerged and formed the foundation of the design: Active circulation space – Corridors are multi-functional, acting as active circulation spaces, with areas for rest or informal activity. The length of these spaces is broken up visually to prevent anxiety in the service-user. Corners of walls are curved where possible – to make them appear ‘softer’, and to encourage flow. Demarcation of space – Carefully designed
thresholds demarcate space without the need for a large number of doors. Differentiation and identification markers assist users with
Numerous design workshops took place with staff to develop the brief and test designs. JANUARY 2018
10 THE NETWORK
©Colin Davison
©Medical Architecture
©Medical Architecture
©Medical Architecture
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