by Tracy Ostroff
Associate Editor

Summary: At the place where the Tagus River joins the Atlantic Ocean, and on a site rife with symbolism as the point from which Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama embarked on his journey around the cape of Africa, a new cancer center will chart a new course for groundbreaking translational research and collaborative clinical care. The Champalimaud Foundation has commissioned Charles Correa Associates as design architect, in collaboration with RMJM Hillier as laboratory and clinical design architects, and Consiste as architect of record, for the design of a 50,000-square-meter research facility and outpatient cancer center.

“The design ties it to the ethos of the nation,” says Colin Mosher, RMJM Hilllier associate principle and lead designer for the cancer center project. “We are tying an institutional building into the community.” The Portuguese government and the population there are responding positively, Mosher reports. The project is “stimulating research in a nation that is about research and discovery.”

Windows of hope
The new facility focuses on translational research, or basic scientific research in the lab, which has the potential to move quickly into a clinical setting. The practice is often used in the U.S.—RMJM Hillier has worked on five other similar projects, including the recently completed Cancer Research Institute at the University of South Alabama—but has been slow to gain traction in Europe. With this new sustainably designed center, the Champalimaud Foundation is the first major European facility devoted exclusively to translational research.

“The beauty of translational spaces,” says Mosher, “is that you get feedback on treatment right there in the facility. It’s about creating drugs that have an application in reality.” The two-way communication works both ways. Patients at the center can see the researchers and clinicians working on the drugs through what the firm symbolically calls a “window of hope.”

Project highlights
The research center is an architectural response to a medical need. The center will care for more than 400 patients and employ more than 500 scientists and 300 administrative and other staff, attracting the best researchers, academics, and medical doctors in the fields of neuroscience and oncology from Portugal and abroad. It will include laboratories for basic and clinical research, an ambulatory care center, vivarium, auditorium, conference rooms, other teaching facilities, and an exhibition area.

The project will include three high-performance buildings that employ optimal energy and resource management. The design team is maximizing daylighting, using light sensors and skylights, and raising the ceilings to make space for clerestories that will allow more sunlight into the space. They are also running water from the Tagus River through cooling beams in the ceiling to cool the water for the building. Radiant flooring will heat the clinical spaces, and the design team is looking at putting wind turbines on the roof. The windows will all be operable, Mosher says, and there’s “no excuse not to,” with the temperate Portuguese climate and the river breezes. The team is seeking one of the top environmental ratings from the European sustainability grading system.

Building A houses the diagnostic, treatment, and wellness centers on the lower levels and the research labs and administration on the upper floors. Building B houses the auditorium, restaurant, and exhibition area on the entrance level and, on the upper level, the conference center, together with the foundation offices connected via an elegant glass bridge to the research labs. Building C is an open-air amphitheatre facing the river for public performances and community events.

The three buildings have been arranged to create an open-to-sky ramped pathway 125 meters (410 feet) long leading diagonally across the site, toward the Atlantic Ocean. The plaza is open to the public and well-suited for exhibitions, performances, or contemplation.

Inspiration point
In addition to the firm’s previous work on cancer-care and translational research facilities, the inspiration for the project comes from Lisbon itself. The designers worked to capture breezes and the views to the river and ocean from the clinical spaces—places connected to their environment.

The architects are taking great care to delineate the interior spaces into public and private areas within the clinical setting. Different seating groupings provide options for people who either want to interact with family members or other patients and those who want privacy during their treatments and procedures. A healing rainforest promotes wayfinding and helps people “forget where they are going” while they are getting there, Mosher says. The garden will be 80 x 40 meters (260 x 130 feet), large enough for a variety of plant species, and will include a butterfly habitat as a symbol of life and vitality. All the waiting areas and a resource center offer Internet connectivity, so that the private spaces almost feel like a place of learning, Mosher says.

The foundation reports that to honor the historic relevance of the site and promote the relationship of the citizens with the sea and the “unknown,” the Champalimaud Research Centre will allow free public access to the waterfront through the wide landscaped areas around the building.