Leeds Teaching Hospital of the Future
Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust has appointed Perkins&Will, led by Penoyre & Prasad with Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects, to deliver two state-of-the-art hospitals integrated into a single building on the Leeds General Infirmary site. The 94,000-square-meter building will include a new home for Leeds Children’s Hospital, as well as an adults’ hospital and maternity centre.
The appointment follows a competition held by the Trust in 2021 to find an architect to design its “Hospitals of the Future” project—one of 40 new hospitals that the UK government has committed to build by 2030 as part of its New Hospital Programme (NHP).
Patient care and well-being is at the centre of the design. All wards orientate toward the outdoors, maximising exposure to daylight and good views. The communal spaces include a rooftop plaza at the heart of the children’s hospital and a garden terrace on the fifth floor of one of the hospitals, complete with plants mirroring the local landscape. A green space in the site’s car park draws inspiration from the surrounding verdant environment.
The design team incorporated digital features throughout the project, including a cutting-edge twin technology that will be used to track the building’s energy performance. Other technology will reduce bureaucratic processes, helping to increase the amount of time physicians and care staff can spend with patients.
Through staff and patient engagement sessions, the design team gathers user input to support the next stage of design development. The adults, children, young people, parents, carers, and clinicians from across the region will be instrumental in helping to shape how the facility might look and feel in these early designs.
This unique team is known globally for designing transformational environments that support the health of communities. They have designed and delivered some of the most innovative hospitals and women’s and children’s care environments in the world.
