September 20, 2006

Architect working on greenfield hospitals — from East to West

PATRICIA WILLIAMS

Staff Writer

TORONTO

Toronto’s Farrow Partnership Architects (FPA) is putting its expertise in the design of health care facilities to good use on greenfield hospital projects on the East and West coasts.

The firm, whose credits include the Carlo Fidani Peel Regional Cancer Centre and Ambulatory Centre at Mississauga’s Credit Valley Hospital, sits on teams chosen to design replacement hospitals in Halifax and Vancouver.

Between them, the two projects will create more than 550 new inpatient beds with a combined area of more than 2.3 million square feet.

Tye Farrow, partner in charge of design at the Farrow Partnership, told Daily Commercial News that “a sense of shared values and mutual respect” led his firm to collaborate with WHW Architects in Halifax and Busby Perkins Will (BPW) in Vancouver.

FPA and WHW were selected to design a regional hospital in Truro, N.S. for the Colchester East Hants Health Authority — the first new hospital to be built in the area in more than 20 years.

The campus will provide 140 inpatient beds within two connected buildings — a 290,000-square foot acute-care facility and an 80,000-square foot ambulatory care wing. Preliminary designs are expected to be completed this fall.

“The aim is to raise the standard, with a new benchmark greenfield hospital for the future,” Farrow said.

Construction is expected to get under way next year.

On the West Coast, FPA is working with BPW to design the 418-bed Legacy project for Providence Health Care.

The two million square foot acute-care facility will replace the existing St. Paul’s Hospital.

The two architectural firms will serve as prime design consultants for the project, which eventually will be delivered as a public-private partnership.

The team will assess two site options: the current, seven-acre St. Paul’s location and a new 18.5 acre greenfield site in False Creek.

Farrow said the facility aims to be “the greenest hospital” in North America.

“Both of our firms are committed to green building, human-centred design and intense collaboration,” he said.

A construction start date has not been announced.

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