7. San Antonio Military Medical Center an addition to the Brooke Army Medical Center; Fort Sam Houston, Texas
RTKL Associates, Inc.
The San Antonio Military Medical Center (SAMMC) is the largest inpatient medical center for the U.S. Department of Defense and the agency’s only American Burn Associated-verified burn center. The building, which opened in 2011, adds 102 beds, a rehabilitation clinic, expanded operating room capabilities, a new emergency department and a new patient bed tower. It also includes a parking structure for 5,000 vehicles, and ancillary support and infrastructure. RTKL was commissioned to design the new 760,000 -square-foot, LEED Silver certified building after working on a number of other projects for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in support of their 2005 Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) initiative. Photos: Charles Davis Smith courtesy RTKL
Category C: Unbuilt
8. Sheikh Khalifa Medical City; Abu Dhabi, UAE
Skidmore, Owings & Merrill in a joint venture with ICME & Tilke as ITS
Sheikh Khalifa Medical City (SKMC) is an 838-bed medical complex in the heart of Abu Dhabi. Designed by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill LLP (SOM) in a joint venture with ICME and Tilke, SKMC contains three hospitals under one roof, combining a General Hospital, tertiary Women’s Hospital, and Pediatric Hospital. This model enhances patient care through specialization while improving efficiency through shared services. Envisioned as a city within a city, the design creates a bustling campus-like environment of distinct character and is based on the notion of patients as guests. The project’s lobbies and public spaces convey a sense of serenity through spaciousness, natural materials and diffused natural light. Renderings: SOM
Category D: Innovations in Planning and Design Research, Built and Unbuilt
9. Brigham and Women's Hospital, Advanced Multimodality Image Guided Operating Room (AMIGO); Boston
Payette
In the groundbreaking clinical research facility, Brigham and Women’s Hospital’s AMIGO Suite, an operating room is linked to adjacent imaging suites, enabling the patient to remain static while the machines—including a 33,000-pound MRI—move from one chamber to another in the midst of a surgical procedure. The array of infrastructure necessary to enable this technology was deftly concealed behind walls and above ceilings, which were kept neutral in appearance so as not to compete with critical patient information displays. The kinetic qualities of the suite are captured on the floor, where the arc of the operating table’s rotation and the limits of the magnet’s Gaussian surfaces are vividly rendered in a palette of colors derived from the facility’s cutting-edge equipment. Photos: Warren Jagger Photography
10. Rethinking the need for emergency department beds
Lennon Associates
The project was to reduce the number of beds, staff and patient waiting times in a major teaching hospital emergency department while at the same time, increase patient safety and comfort. This study concluded that 60% of emergency department patients did not need to be in a bed, but could be seen in a less intense setting. Building less beds, needs less staff and requires a new physical layout to accommodate the new patient flow. That gave rise to new possibilities of enhanced patient spaces with amenities resembling that of airline first class accommodations. Computer simulations were liberally used to establish the size and staffing required for the new patient flow model. That was further buttressed by physical trials using actual patients. Renderings: Lennon Associates
11. Kaleida Health, Gates Vascular Institute and UB Clinical Translational Research Center; Buffalo, New York
Cannon Design
Photo: Thomas Mayer Photography
The spirit of collaboration was the driving force uniting Kaleida Health and the University at Buffalo within a single structure, and the building strives to bring several disciplines and its patients, surgeons and researchers, together to exchange knowledge and ignite innovation. The 476,000-square-foot facility achieves this by stacking a translational research building over a clinical vascular institute. The first four floors of this 10-story “vertical campus,” house the Gates Vascular Institute, with the Clinical Translational Research Center occupying the top half of the building. Sandwiched between the two, is a two-level “collaborative core”—the binder that connects doctors and researchers from varying specialties to meet in a variety of dynamic situations to accelerate medical discoveries—moving science from the bench to the bedside.
Photo: Bjorg Magnea Architectural & Interior Photography
Photo: Thomas Mayer Photography
Photo: Tim Wilkes Photography
Photo: Bjorg Magnea Architectural & Interior Photography
![](/sites/default/files/22-GVICTRC_0.jpg)
Photo: Tim Wilkes Photography
Category E: Master Planning Urban Design for Healthcare Settings
12. Focal Point Community Campus; Chicago
HDR Architecture, Inc.
Located in Southwest Chicago, it is one of the most vibrant, yet blighted, neighborhoods in the city. Acting as both an anchor and a change agent, the hospital is envisioned as an urban campus that fosters a relationship between the hospital and its community. The two are intrinsically linked by a “circulatory system” – a band of food and retail markets, fitness centers, etc. that runs along the third floor of the building. This system serves as the interface between the world of healthcare and the world beyond, and it literally brings the two together – a new paradigm in the industry. Furthermore, the building treads lightly on the site. Its ground floor is wrapped with glass and its grounds are replete with wellness gardens, soccer fields, and basketball courts. Renderings: HDR Architecture
For more, see the AIA press release.
Related Stories
| May 17, 2011
Gilbane partners with Steel Orca on ultra-green data center
Gilbane, along with Crabtree, Rohrbaugh & Associates, has been selected to partner with Steel Orca to design and build a 300,000-sf data center in Bucks County, Pa., that will be powered entirely through renewable energy sources--gas, solar, fuel cells, wind and geo-thermal. Completion is scheduled for 2013.
| May 17, 2011
Should Washington, D.C., allow taller buildings?
Suggestions are being made that Washington revise its restrictions on building heights. Architect Roger Lewis, who raised the topic in the Washington Post a few weeks ago, argues for a modest relaxation of the height limits, and thinks that concerns about ruining the city’s aesthetics are unfounded.
| May 17, 2011
The New Orleans master plan
At an afternoon panel during last week's AIA National Conference in New Orleans, Goody Clancy Principal David Dixon and Manning Principal W. Raymond Manning shared their experiences creating the New Orleans Master Plan, a document that sets a new course for the city, from land use and transportation planning to environmental protection.
| May 17, 2011
Do these buildings look like buffalo to you?
It’s hard to contemplate winter now that we’re mid-spring, but when the seasons change, ice skaters in Winnipeg will be able to keep warm in plywood shelters designed by Patkau Architects. The designers created temporary shelters inspired by animal behavior—specifically, buffalo bracing against the wind. Check them out.
| May 16, 2011
USGBC and AIA unveil report for greening K-12 schools
The U.S. Green Building Council and the American Institute of Architects unveiled "Local Leaders in Sustainability: A Special Report from Sundance," which outlines a five-point national action plan that mayors and local leaders can use as a framework to develop and implement green schools initiatives.
| May 16, 2011
Dassault Systèmes to distribute Gehry Technologies’ digital project
Dassault Systèmes and Gehry Technologies announced that Gehry Technologies’ Digital Project products will be integrated into the Dassault Systèmes’ portfolio and distributed through Dassault Systèmes. Digital Project is a suite of 3D BIM applications created by Gehry Technologies using Dassault Systèmes’ CATIA as a core modeling engine.
| May 11, 2011
DOE releases guide for 50% more energy-efficient office buildings
The U.S. Department of Energy today announced the release of the first in a new series of Advanced Energy Design Guides to aid in the design of highly energy efficient office buildings. The 50% AEDG series will provide a practical approach to commercial buildings designed to achieve 50% energy savings compared to the commercial building energy code used in many areas of the country.
| May 10, 2011
Google hires Ingenhoven Architects to design new Mountain View office
The current Googleplex is straining at the seams and yet the company is preparing its biggest hiring surge ever, so Google decided now’s the time to build its own office space—a first for the Internet giant. The company hired Ingenhoven Architects, a German firm that specializes in sustainable architecture, to create plans for what could be a 600,000-sf office.
| May 10, 2011
Solar installations on multifamily rooftops aid social change
The Los Angeles Business Council's study on the feasibility of installing solar panels on the city’s multifamily buildings shows there's tremendous rooftop capacity, and that a significant portion of that rooftop capacity comes from buildings in economically depressed neighborhoods. Solar installations could therefore be used to create jobs, lower utility costs, and improve conditions for residents in these neighborhood.
| May 10, 2011
Dinner is now served…atop the Lincoln Memorial?
Take a look at the temporary restaurant sitting atop Brussels’ historic Arc de Triomphe-Triomfboog. The Cube, by Electrolux, offers 18 diners a spectacular view of the Parc du Cinquantenair, and is one of two structures traveling across Europe, making stops at famous landmarks in Belgium, Italy, Switzerland, Sweden, and Russia. What do you think about one of these 60-tonne structures being placed on a U.S. memorial?