Step Exhibitions
Combe Valley Hospital – Gilling Dod Architects
Nominee Information
Combe Valley Hospital in a pioneering in-patient mental health hospital in Bexhill-on-Sea that is currently under construction. Providing wards for working-age adults and older adults alongside a neuromodulation and education suites, the building has been design in a co-production with experts-by-experience, service users, and staff.
The natural setting for Combe Valley is ideal for a mental health hospital, providing an exciting opportunity to create a tranquil and therapeutic healing environment for patients. The building is nestled gently into a rolling green hill. Landscaping is key to the design and the building will benefit from internal gardens as well as widespread greenery surrounding the site.
The main entrance of the hospital will be at the end of a tree-lined avenue, and it will wrap around a ‘Village Green’. At the building entrance, people will see through the reception area to the ‘Village Green’ and beyond, creating light and an openness to the interior. The green will be surrounded by a café, visiting rooms and shared therapy spaces. Beyond that, there will three wards towards the quieter, more private side of the site.
The wards have been design in a first-of-its kind X-wing shape which means that no patient bedrooms face on to the ward gardens but instead look out across the wider rear gardens, ensuring privacy and dignity, and bedroom corridors are single-sided which ensures that they are filled with natural light. It ensures that bedrooms are set in small clusters.
Bedrooms are an individual’s sanctuary. This is why Combe Valley’s bedrooms have been given extra care and consideration. So, for instance, the Trust worked with service users and staff to make sure there was agreement about what would be the ideal bed position.
Bedrooms will be complemented by a half-bay window which is angled towards the bed so that people can look directly out of the window towards trees and other greenery. The half bay will also incorporate a window seat and a desk/dressing table, making sure that people can benefit from natural light and calming views of nature at all times.
The co-production nature has been a real highlight of the project, with experts by experience being integral to every decision of the design journey. The service user experience has been at the heart of every decision, first impressions on arrival, food prepared in fresh-cook kitchens, wonderful therapeutic facilities, the colours and finishes, and high-quality garden spaces.
This ethos also extended to staff care. Staff rest rooms and changing facilities are provided in every ward and department.
This rigorous and thorough approach has also been extended to sustainability and resilience. Heating is provided by air-source heat pumps. Electricity is provided by PV panels. Materials are locally soured as much as possible while recognising the need for specialist mental health components. The use of energy in the building is greatly minimised by ultra low U-values and air-tightness targets.
We very much look forward to the building completing.
