kaiser-permanente-hospital: Kaiser-Permanente Hospital, Baldwin Park, California, USA
Designed 1988 with Francisco Kripacz
The Kaiser Permanente Hospital is a 3-stage hospital facility. The first phase consists of medical offices and parking completed in 1991. The second phase is a 600-bed hospital with additional parking finished in 1993. Finally, an outpatient clinic completed the project in 1994.
The hospital sits next to a major freeway. The master plan used a 4 story parking structure to mask the sound from the freeway and neighbouring traffic. This structure encloses 3 sides of the property with the objective of providing a quiet garden in the interior. The 600-bed unit sits in a lake that creates a cool, refreshing and quiet park for patients to stroll. Planting berms against the parking structure, planters and trellises for vines disguise it as a "greened" building at the edge of the park.
The medical office building and outpatient clinic are each distinctive in appearance and location so visitors have no difficulty in orientation. The exterior walls are clad in silver toned metal with accents of yellow, green, or scarlet to designate the use. Buoyant colours are also used inside for similar designations as well as cheerful accents to an otherwise quiet palette of hues.
Photo courtesy the Erickson Collection
