According to RIBA Publishing, publishers of a new book, Changing Hospital Architecture, as “background buildings”, “showing considerable consistency of component parts and key issues around the world”, hospitals “rarely excite passion in mainstream architectural and design culture”.
Written by “distinguished experts” in healthcare design and edited by RIBA president Sunand Prasad, Changing Hospital Architecture is described as “a timely and important work set to challenge old attitudes and galvanise the debate about design quality in our health buildings”.
Sunand Prasad added: “Hospital architecture has become isolated as a specialist field, lagging behind the most inventive, progressive developments in the art and science of architecture.
Reconnecting hospital design with wider design culture, and bringing in more committed, skilful architects currently working outside the field, are crucial to improving the quality of hospital environments.”
The new, full colour book “shows what can be achieved by reflecting on the UK’s current hospital building programme in the light of historical and international experience”.
After opening chapters considering the post-war history of British hospital design, it examines the “crucial and undervalued early inception stages” of a hospital, and analyses the changing context of the financing and construction of UK hospitals. The following chapters draw on international case studies.
