Page 99 - AIT1117_E-Paper

Entwurf • Design dRMM architects, GB-London
Bauherr • Client Maggie´s Centres, GB-Glasgow
Standort • Location Sheepfoot Ln, GB-Oldham
Nutzfläche • Floor space 260 m 2
Fotos • Photos Jasmin Sohi, Alex de Rijke
Mehr Information • More information 136

MAGGIE’S CENTRE

IN OLDHAM

It is the legacy of a strong woman: Margaret Keswick
Jencks died of breast cancer 22 years ago. One year later,
the first Maggie’s Centre already opened in Edinburgh.
The meanwhile 21st cancer aid centre, in Oldham near
Manchester, began operating in the summer of this year.
The London dRMM architectural office designed the light-
flooded and completely timber-construction place of
peace and contemplation.

T he wife of the American architecture theorist Charles Jencks – called
Maggie by her friends – had made the distressing experience during
her cancer therapy that the environment of traditional clinics is hardly
able to have a positive influence on the psyche of the sufferers. Together
with her husband, two years prior to her death she had started to think
about treatment facilities which complement the clinics with a pleasant
setting for medical consultation and psychological support. This resulted
in the Maggie Keswick Jencks Cancer Caring Centres Trust (also see AIT
11.2015). For planning its facilities, the foundation – also due to the good
Grundriss • Floor plan contacts of Charles Jencks – was able to involve internationally renowned
architects such as Zaha Hadid, Rem Koolhaas or Richard Rogers. For Alex
de Rijke, co-founder of the London dRMM architectural office and, as Dean
of the Royal College of Arts, an active supporter of timber architecture, it
was an honour and a concern at the same time to take on the planning
of the meanwhile 21st Maggie´s Centre, this time in Oldham. This is becau-
se he sees an immediate connection between developing cancer and the
built environment as well as the materials used. The question of the con-
struction material for his “well-made, carefully proportioned, simple box”,
as de Rijke claims, was no issue for him as the planner of the first buil-
dings made of cross-laminated timber in Great Britain. The low, wood-
clad cube now stands on thin stilts in the clinic grounds and hovers airily
and lightly above the garden. The construction of cross-laminated hard-
wood – the first worldwide – also reflects in the interior: American tulip
wood covers the walls and the ceilings and is also used for the furnishing.
The single-storey building is penetrated by a glass sculpture reminding of
an oversized Alvar Aalto vase which links the interior with the garden and
the sky. Arranged around it are small, more private rooms, a kitchen unit
with a cafeteria and a seating ensemble with a fireplace which can be
separated with a curtain. What all the zones have in common is a warm
atmosphere characterized by the yellow colour of the flooring and the
Schnitt • Section wooden surfaces as well as a view of nature – an elaborate manifesto for
healthcare architecture.

AIT 11.2017 • 099