Project category: Project in progress (March 2007)

Chief administrator: Cherie Gorby, Senior Administrator and COO, (719) 365-5053

Firm: Jonathan Bailey Associates, (469) 227-3900

Design team: Tom Dwyer, Principal-in-Charge; Nestor Infanzon, FAIA, Design Director; Dallas Hughes, Project Manager; Phyllis Sheridan Infanzon, AIA, Project Designer; Peter Kuo, AIA, Project Architect

Total building area (sq. ft.): 209,000

Construction cost/sq. ft.: $321

Total construction cost (excluding land): $67,000,000

Memorial Hospital North, Phase One, is the start of a large health-focus campus that will integrate an acute care hospital and several medical office buildings into an elegant, efficient design. The overall master plan calls for a 500-bed, full-service hospital; 500,000 square feet of medical office buildings; an assisted living and wellness center; and a small hotel on an 81.3-acre landscaped campus.

Designed by Jonathan Bailey Associates, the facility is devoted to enhancing patients’ overall well-being through a variety of professional clinical services that encourage the renewal of mind, body, and spirit. The design provides rooms with privacy and comfort for patients and families. Natural colors and materials grace interior spaces, and gardens dot the campus, linking it with beautiful natural surroundings.

The 200,000-square-foot hospital facility offers full diagnostic and treatment services, encompassing surgery, imaging, radiology, occupational medicine, emergency and urgent care, and a laboratory. Outpatient services include laboratory services, rehabilitation, and cardiac services. Women’s health services provides a 13-bed inpatient LDRP unit and nursery. Memorial Hospital North is currently configured to house 90 inpatient beds. Plans for future growth have not been determined, but the site will accommodate up to a 500-bed hospital.

Jonathan Bailey follows a standard practice of allowing those who use a facility to be involved in the design, ensuring an attractive, patient-centric, and functional result. The design team conceptualized the hospital as more spa-like than clinical, integrating the dramatic natural surroundings into the design and construction, selecting warm interior-design motifs, showcasing the terrific views of Pikes Peak in the two-story atrium, and creating a serene ambience with a series of healing gardens.

Staff benefit from a rational floor plan that minimizes walking distances and maximizes patient observation, while still allowing direct engagement with the outdoors. Patient rooms, arranged in oval-shaped clusters near nursing stations, are treated more like living rooms, providing privacy and comfort to patients and family members.

The design of Memorial Hospital North was informed by holistic principles for patient-centered care. The designers recognized the environment as a vital component in the healing process, calling for solutions that would create links with nature and foster comfort, dignity, and family involvement in the medical care process. This project encourages the inclusion of a variety of nonclinical resources such as libraries, activity rooms, gardens, and other amenities that help to relax, invigorate, and heal the patient.