Situation

After forty years of activity, it was necessary moving the Andalusian Ophthalmological Institute from the old clinic, which was an old flat, to another location on the street level.

Factors like the strong competition in the health sector and the age of the flat lead to the choice to move all the activities in other spaces.

Because of this, the local of 450 sqm was moved in the same avenue. Its depth, low ceilings and the net of pillars determined the interior spaces distribution.

República Argentina Avenue is one of the most important and busiest streets in Los Remedios neighborhood in Seville, whereby some of the most important shops of the city are based and moreover it is the institutional headquarters and city hall offices. Many private clinics are located in this area, but being different, avoiding contrasts, was our main goal.

Strategy

In this contest, our approach couldn’t follow the usual design guidelines of the other clinics, where the introverted and opaque look of the buildings hide all of the activities that take place in. This project starts from a commercial approach: the clinic is open to the urban space in order to generate more impact: showing the view of its activity as a marketing strategy, the clinic is the best showcase of itself.

Blurring the limits between the public and the private was the main challenge of the project. To realize a connection at the external, we proposed the same treatment for both the façade and interior finishing. The intention was to establish no differences between the street and the lobby dissolving the boundaries. A sinuous and continuous skin of wood and golden sheet iron, confers to the clinic its identity image. In this way the clinic is part of the street and the line between public and private is reduced to a glass. We generate, through this wraparound material, a faithful identity to the strategy that we are seeking. A corporate and distinctive image from nearby clinics.

The hall area is conceived as a flexible and large lobby that optimizes the available surface. It is like a street domestic appendix that is transformed to offer a spatial concept much more stimulating and intimate. The wooden slats of beech, the golden color of the sheet iron, the absence of corners and warm LED lights contribute to have an environment like this.

A waiting room with a capacity of around 60 people, as required from the  current legislation, is realized in an area of 100-120 sqm, that always keeps its look outside. Street traffic distracts patients mind, who, waiting for the medical appointment, escape from their thoughts. Medical cabinets keep a sober look that the lobby doesn’t have, as the indoor activities require aseptic spaces, privacy and concentration.

The efficient organization of the program was studied by the flow of patients throughout the clinic, as with the clinic admission, data, pre-consultation, consultation, treatments and diagnostic tests spaces.

It has been sought a balance between a vibrant space, a well-defined corporate identity and an efficient organization of the program.