Buschow Henley Architects

Projects

Housing
Private Houses
Education
Healthcare
Wandsworth Bridge Road
St. John's Therapy Centre
Waldron Health Centre
Centre for Reproductive Medicine
Commercial
Arts & Culture
Leisure & Exhibitions
Adaptive Reuse
Regeneration
Urban Design

The design of this private clinic evolved through an understanding of patients' emotional and psychological needs by recognising the potential of the environment to respond to emotional difficulties associated with infertility and its treatment.

A move from their Harley Street offices offered the opportunity, not only to increase the useable area, but to review the time-worn aesthetic of consulting room and clinic. The brief comprised three distinct areas including those for patients (reception and three consulting rooms), administrators (admin offices, nurses office, and back-of-house services) and finally a world-class laboratory with operating theatre to carry out all procedures in-house – this last designed in collaboration with Jacques Cohen, the world-renowned embryologist.

Visitors enter between richly textured timber walls which soothe. Sinuous, they cocoon and lead patients around the clinic. Similarly, sheer curtains mimic the ebb and flow of the timber walls whilst allowing natural light to filter through whilst still maintaining privacy. Whilst functional, the consulting rooms continue the concern for the patient by, for example, using uplighters which reflect light off the ceilings rather than shine it into the eyes of the patients, who are often looking upwards from a bed.

A key requirement was the creation and maintenance of an environment free of particulates, aldehydes and volatile organics. To achieve this each construction material and component used was analysed to meet these strict criteria. The net result of this level of care and attention has resulted in rates of fertility well in excess of the average.

The project is published in the RIBA Journal (June 2002).

The practice is currently constructing an extension to the facilities
previously provided expected to be complete by September 2008.