Virtual Building Tour – Zayed Centre for Research into Rare Disease in Children by Stanton Williams

Virtual Building Tour – Zayed Centre for Research into Rare Disease in Children by Stanton Williams

The 2021 series of the AIA UK Chapter’s “Virtual Building Tours” kicked off on 12 January with a visit to the Zayed Centre for Research into Rare Disease in Children designed by Stanton Williams.  The public-facing research facility, located in the heart of London’s Knowledge Quarter, is conceived as a holistic space where science, city and human lives come together.  Gavin Henderson, Principal Director, led the participants through a thought-provoking tour of the facility that was completed and opened in 2019.

Stanton Williams was the winner of the AIA UK 2020 Excellence in Design Award for a Professional Design Practice for a Large Project with their Zayed Centre.  The centre is a 13,000sqm public-facing research facility that celebrates the often ‘invisible’ work of researchers and clinicians and their vital contribution to the development of treatments for disease.  In contrast to traditional research facilities, the Zayed Centre breaks the mould by highlighting the on-going process of science.  A ground floor fully opened to the floor above gives prominence to the activities inside the laboratories by allowing viewing from within the Centre as well as from the adjacent urban context.

Gavin Henderson states, “The opportunity to work with Great Ormond Street Hospital, UCL and GOSH Charity to make a building that was about science and medical care in the heart of the city on such a public and symbolic site opposite Coram’s Fields seemed very powerful. We felt very strongly that we wanted to give public visibility to science and allow people in the public realm to understand what the building was about and give a sense of the life-changing activities taking place inside.”

As explained by Henderson, Coram’s Fields in Bloomsbury was the site of the London Foundling Hospital, established in 1739, by philanthropist Thomas Coram to treat and care for disadvantaged children. A music programme promoted by composer George Frideric Handel and a public art gallery founded by the painter William Hogarth were unique components of the healing experience at the hospital.  This has an appropriate synergy with the Zayed Centre for Research, which is similarly active in engaging with the arts and city life. 

Coram’s Fields and the building engage in an open dialogue with the life of the city, whilst the building contextually addresses each of its neighbours through the designer’s choice of traditional colours and clay materials, used in a contemporary way.

At the base of the building, is the 600 sqm double-height principal laboratory. It is visible from all sides within the Zayed Centre while simultaneously providing a dialogue with the urban landscape as one first approaches from both the west and from Coram’s Fields located to the north. A considered shared, single entrance bridge passes above these laboratories, deliberately merging both research staff and patients, drawing them into a central atrium flooded with daylight. A fully glazed façade and carefully articulated terracotta fins provide framed views of Coram’s Fields from within, while the glass screen cladding of the upper level clean rooms set back from the main façade reflect the changing sky. 

The Zayed Centre brings together cutting-edge research and world-leading clinical care to drive new trials, treatments from lab to bedside and cures for children with rare and complex diseases simultaneously creating a dialogue with its urban surroundings. It is truly an inventive institution.

The AIA UK Chapter is hosting a new virtual building tour series for the 2021 season based on Winners of AIA UK 2020 Excellence in Design Awards. The series offers architects the opportunity to visit notable buildings that have particular design interests in the UK and abroad.  Follow this link for further information to participate in the next tour of the English National Ballet, Project by Glenn Howells on 11 February 2021.

Written by: Gregory Fonseca, AIA