Adrian Smith, FAIA, consulting design partner in the Chicago office of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, will be presented City of Hope’s Spirit of Life® Award at the construction and real estate industry’s annual dinner on Chicago’s Navy Pier November 3. Smith, who is currently leading a year-long campaign expected to raise more than $300,000 for City of Hope Cancer Center, will receive the honor for his efforts in the community and his leadership in the construction and real estate industry. Nearly 1,000 industry executives will attend the reception and dinner. Here, Smith tells AIArchitect about his involvement with the City of Hope and shares some thoughts about how health-care architecture can help advance medical research and patient care.

Q. Why is the City of Hope an organization you support?
A. The City of Hope is a vital organization in the search for a cure to our society’s most pressing complex health challenges—such as cancer, AIDS, and diabetes—through research, treatment, and education programs. They have a proven record of accomplishment in this regard and are totally focused on finding cures using groundbreaking research, such as immunotherapy and tumor immunology. They are the only institution with four FDA-authorized clinical trials using genetically reprogrammed T-cells and the largest freestanding biologic production facility in the nation. In addition, a very high percentage of donations go directly to research.

Q. What is it like partnering with your colleagues/competitors in an endeavor such as this fund raising effort for the City of Hope?
A. It is very gratifying to be involved with your peers in the real estate, construction, and design industry in support of the goals and objectives of the City of Hope. I believe that we, as professionals, are in a daily partnership in the exercising of our skills to advance the quality of the built environment and that the accomplishment of our competitors is a contribution to the whole of society upon which we can all build. Our collaboration with them regarding the City of Hope takes this premise to a different level—a more broad-reaching level—and what we have in common is a desire to enhance the quality of life for all.

Q. What are the newest advances in health/medical and science/research architecture that will help advance medical research and patient care?
A. I am not an expert in this field of architecture, but I know that there are significant advances in the use of materials and construction techniques and mechanical ventilation systems that make biomedical research and application a feasible option for the discovery of new cures. Many—in fact, most—of the medical facilities around the world are not designed for the extremely demanding clean environments necessary to carry on such research and treatment.

I recently toured one new facility that provides state-of-the-art accommodations for advanced medical research and patient care: the Helford Clinical Research Hospital on the City of Hope campus. It is a spectacular facility that will accelerate the City of Hope’s paradigm for translational medicine by turning scientific discoveries into improved treatments. It will help usher in a new era of advanced research, education, and patient care.

Q. How can scientific research efforts be fostered through design?
A. Designing complex clinical and research facilities is as much diagnostic as it is programmatic. It’s diagnostic in the context of defining the nature of the current activity with known research techniques—as well as that which is likely to take place in the next 5, 10, and 20 years as research and care advance to a status we can only dream of at this point. Good design can help the medical community to plan ahead in the design and construction of their facilities, even to the demolition of functionally obsolete facilities. It can also provide innovative and creative components to allow for the dreams and inspirations of the scientific community to develop.

Q. Can you point to a few projects that exemplify that type of architecture?
A. I think there are very few projects that explore the opportunities and possibilities for future needs and discoveries that can change the way medicine is practiced. There must be biomedical research and health-care architecture specialists who focus not only on the technological advances of today but also on the medical profession of tomorrow so that we can work together with our medical and research professionals to anticipate constantly the future space needs. Most medical facilities built today are very inflexible and can easily become obsolete when new discoveries demand a different environment.

Q. What are other philanthropic endeavors in which you are involved?
A. I am involved as a board member to the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and on the advisory board for their new Department of Architecture and Design. I am a governor for the Urban Land Institute Foundation and a representative for the RIBA British Architectural Library Trust. I am also very active in the Chicago Central Area Committee, a group of civic leaders that identifies and seeks solutions for the Chicago Central Business District. My wife Nancy and I are also contributors to Open Lands organizations for the preservation of open spaces within our communities.

—Tracy Ostroff

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