a colorful mural on the wall of a children's wing of a hospital

February 6, 2023

5 Global Firms Take a Holistic Approach to Healthy Spaces

Whether a skin-care clinic or a multisport center, firms from Hong Kong to the Czech Republic are taking holistic approaches to creating healthful spaces.

Global Firms Take Innovative Approaches to Spaces That Prioritize Health and Wellness

IDOM

L’usine des Sports, Tarbes, France

an indoor rock climbing wall in shades of green — Photography by Pedro Pegenaute.

a person stands in the center of a basketball court with green walls — Photography by Pedro Pegenaute.

A 1937 artillery factory in south- west France finds new life as a center for track and field, basketball, handball, badminton, and rock climbing, its 65-foot height set under the rhythmic geometry of a sawtooth roof. Chartreuse-accented interventions, such as a mezzanine viewing gallery and towering climbing walls, cleverly zone the ample square footage.

NC Design & Architecture Limited

Vitae, Hong Kong

a seating area in a cosmetics clinic in shades of blush — Photography by HDP Photography.

a stone counter in the lobby of a cosmetics clinic — Photography by HDP Photography.

At the top of the Peninsula Office Tower—an extension of the city’s iconic hotel—with views of Victoria Harbor, this floor-though cosmetics clinic reads like a collectible-design gallery. Blush-pink plaster walls and plush carpet and marble flooring arranged in concentric circles surround such sculptural furniture as a totemlike floor lamp and cocooning seating.

ARG Studio and Francisca Ramalho

Hospital São João, Porto, Portugal

rocking horses rest in a green and cream children's play area in a pediatric ward of a hospital — Photography by Ivo Tavares Studio.

a person rests in the window of a play room in a pediatric wing of a hospital — Photography by Ivo Tavares Studio.

Channeling whimsy and optimism, Lisbon-based artist Ramalho used ARG’s effective chromatic interior architecture for a pediatric ward as the jumping-off point for bright lenticular graphics strewn like children’s toys across a wall. They’re joined by a joyful installation of kite shapes flying high along the entry corridor’s louvered ceiling.

NBBJ

The University of California San Francisco Connie Frank Transplant Center

a person checks in at the rounded welcome desk at a transplant center — Photography by Benjamin Benschneider.

a white paneled welcome desk with oak accents — Photography by Benjamin Benschneider.

The renovation and expansion of the center in a Brutalist 1970’s building highlights its previously hidden original concrete columns and arched beams. A newly simplified palette pairs white solid-surfacing with engineered oak, while cove lighting inspired by the tendrils of fog that often blanket the Bay Area trace the free-flowing plan.

Formafatal

Cellularium, Prague

a blue cryotherapy chamber — Photography by BoysPlayNice.

red and grey glass-rods on the circular wall of a medical spa — Photography by BoysPlayNice.

The skinny, slanted, load-bearing columns of DAM Architekti’s futuristic Main Point Pankrác buildings is echoed in the interiors of this medical spa within the complex. Each room is circular, like an enlarged pillar, a shape repeated in the solid-oak dowels descending from the ceiling and the glass-rod half-walls wrapping saunas and the cryotherapy chamber.

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