Bendigo Hospital, Bendigo, VIC

STH worked with the successful Exemplar Health Consortium to deliver the Bendigo Hospital Project as a Victorian Public Private Partnership. Now the largest regional hospital development in Victoria, it delivers world-class healthcare facilities and provides a welcoming, holistic and positive environment that promotes wellbeing.

The hospital is an inclusive environment that incorporates community facilities such as an indigenous garden, childcare centre and 128 serviced apartments. Importantly the hospital reduces the need for patients to travel to Melbourne and creates an essential asset for the future healthcare needs of a growing regional population. This significant civic building integrates a holistic framework considering the needs of patients, staff and the community and offering a tranquil and caring environment through the integration of architecture, landscaping, health planning and evidence-based design.

Taking inspiration from the scale and proportion of Bendigo’s heritage buildings, the design introduces a street-scale rhythm of vertical framing elements to the podium. This establishes a more friendly and human scale to the hospital.

A north-south civic axis provides a clear and welcoming entrance to the hospital, culminating with a triple height internal street. Rather than the building acting as a barrier, this axis creates an important link through the site. A bespoke woven timber ceiling is a focal point in the internal street. The pattern filters daylight providing ever-changing dappled light. The use of timber and the quality of light provides a sense of warmth and helps to increase wellbeing. A strong sculptural form, the IPU is the main civic element of the hospital and is clearly separated from the podium. Designed from the inside out the, the rectilinear forms visually connect to the surrounding context. All internal corridors terminate in a floor-to-ceiling view of the landscape, while rooms have generous uninterrupted views and access to natural light.

Stage One of the new facility is located at 100 Barnard Street, Bendigo featuring 372 inpatient beds; an integrated cancer centre; an 80-bed psychiatric services precinct including a parent-infant unit, 11 new operating theatres and retail and café outlets for staff, patients and visitors. Creating a tranquil environment for patients, staff and visitors, the new hospital also offers 48 courtyards and terraces integrated into its design.

STH completed this project in collaboration with Bates Smart. It has won numerous awards culminating with the Sir Zelman Cowan Award for Public Architecture, 2018 at the National Architecture Awards.

PROJECT SIZE: 74,770 m²

PROJECT STATUS: Completed 2017

CLIENT: Exemplar Health and VHHSBA (Victorian Health and Human Services Building Authority)

PHOTOGRAPHY: Shannon McGrath, Latitude Group, John Gollings BACK