Patients and visitors at the Breast Cancer Centre at St Bartholomew's Hospital start their journey at a tranquil and welcoming Georgian square. Designed by Greenhill Jenner Associates.
The Centre is housed in the West Wing, a Grade 1 listed building by James Gibbs, completed in 1752, forming part of an Italianate square.
The refurbished building aims to put patients at ease. Consultation with users, including former patients, played an important part in shaping its design as did research visits to cancer care centres in the US and elsewhere in the UK. Careful consideration was given to the patient pathway through the building and to the colour schemes, furniture, fabrics, carpets and fittings which were all selected to give the interior an ambience of calm and comfort. Bringing breast cancer services into a single building also allowed the introduction of other facilities which would have been more difficult to achieve in the dispersed service the new centre replaced.
The architect, Greenhill Jenner Associates, was appointed in autumn 2000 after a standard OJEC selection process. Building work began in November 2002 and the completed building was commissioned in May 2004.
