Project category: New construction (completed January 2004)

Chief administrator: Alan Olive, Administrator, (775) 982-5507

Firm: HMC Architects of Nevada, (775) 322-9475

Design team: Architecture, HMC Architects of Nevada; Structural Engineering, Blakely Johnson & Ghusn, Inc.; Electrical Engineering, PK Electrical, Inc.; Mechanical Engineering, Petty & Associates, Inc.; Civil Engineering, CFA, Inc.; General Contracting, Shaver Construction

Photography: © Vance Fox Photography

Total building area (sq. ft.): 52,000

Construction cost/sq. ft.: $500

Total construction cost (excluding land): $26,000,000


The client requested a state-of-the-art facility, reinforcing its commitment to cutting-edge patient care and challenging designers to retrofit the existing residential-like facility with high-tech healthcare delivery. The resulting structure is a complete design departure that creates a new identity and strong statement about healthcare through architecture. As the design evolved, the design team coined the phrase “high-tech meets home” to describe the hospital’s mission to create a campus with state-of-the-art medical technology that provides a home for healing.

This new diagnostic and treatment pavilion houses an in- and outpatient surgery center, an emergency department, an imaging department, a laboratory, and a centralized patient-admitting center and lobby.

Patient and staff comfort were primary concerns throughout the design process. As a result, patient and ambulance entrances are separated, and patient drop-off is now more visible from the street. All diagnostic and intake services are grouped on the first floor, dramatically decreasing patient travel time and staff inefficiencies. A bridge connects the existing hospital to the new pavilion, creating flow between the buildings.


The design process included three “fast track” packages to accelerate construction. Site grading and utilities were under construction as schematic design was completed for the core and shell. The core-and-shell package and the tenant-improvement (TI) package were completed simultaneously. Building shape, vertical circulation, and primary circulation of the core and shell were resolved before schematic design for the TIs was completed.