The Uci-Covid building by PMMT Arquitectura , is located in the Parc Sanitari Pere Virgili in the city of Barcelona and is the result of research with the Catalan Health System to respond to the arrival of Covid-19. The building has been designed to support the existing health network.

The construction is designed to provide spaces for all its inhabitants, such as patients, health workers, and cleaning and maintenance staff. In addition, the building is integrated into its surroundings due to its volumetry, location, and even the white color of the facades that are assimilated to the rest of the buildings in the area. The project is a finalist in the CSCAE 2022 awards.
The Uci-Covid building, by PMMT Arquitectura, is flexible and takes advantage of its location to achieve a suitable orientation. Its use can be transformed in the future according to the needs of a given moment, for which several flexibility strategies have been established. For example, the modular structure, and corridors are designed to fit any sanitary use, and the lighting is programmed according to the needs of the building.

The careful interior treatment of the materials and the lighting system show special attention to its occupants. The lighting is programmed according to different scenes, days and nights, but also thinking about the comfort of the user, making a gradation between spaces of passage and health care. The aim is to avoid excessive and homogeneous lighting that does not recognize the different intensities.


Uci-Covid Building by PMMT Arquitectura. Photograph by Del Río Bani.
 

Description of project by PMMT Arquitectura

This Multi-purpose Hospital Building is the result of research carried out in conjunction with the Catalan Health System, in response to the arrival of Covid-19 in March 2020. The building is designed to support the existing health network at a time of pandemic and also in the future, as it can transform its use according to the needs of the health center to which it is linked. This process materialized in a typological model that can be implemented close to any hospital, to support the local health network according to the specific needs of the center. The organization of the building is very efficient and safe for the professionals, but it is also designed to offer humanized spaces, designed for the people who have to live in them, from patients and healthcare workers to cleaning and maintenance staff.

This Multi-purpose Hospital Building is one of five buildings of the same type to be constructed in Catalonia during the last quarter of 2020. Compact: It is a building designed as a satellite of an existing hospital, taking advantage of the infrastructures and available land within the hospital grounds. This makes it a high-rise building, to adapt to small plots or those with complicated orography. It has 4 floors and occupies the smallest possible area of land for the number of beds planned. It has a floor area of only 975 m2 for 4 floors and 88 beds. OFFSITE construction: The project and construction work was completed in 20 weeks with an industrialized system designed for a service life of more than 40 years.

The off-site construction of the structural modules and façades has made it possible to reduce the time required. The management of the entire process has followed the Lean construction methodology, with monitoring of the planning and restrictions to manage the work in real-time. The weekly participation of all the agents on the site has been essential to control the process and adjust to the terms. Flexible: The use can be transformed in the future according to the needs of the center, and different flexibility strategies are incorporated: Modular structure: bays designed to fit any healthcare use. The parametric window: a continuous and modular window with vertical mullions every meter that allows receiving partitions in a modular way, facilitating the change of distribution without affecting the façade. In addition, this window is repeated on all the facades, making the manufacturing and assembly process much easier. Provision for reserve downpipes to facilitate the transformation to consultations. Rooms: there are currently different sizes of rooms for 5, 3, or 2 people designed in a pandemic context. They have been designed with the possibility of dividing them in the future.

Integrated into the environment: The building is integrated into the urban context on a city scale. The volumetry, the location, and the white color of the façades are assimilated to the rest of the existing buildings in the Parc Sanitari. On the ground floor, the building generates an access courtyard. A transition space that allows different separate accesses necessary to differentiate the circuits and generate a non-COVID waiting area in the open air. Safe: The vertical connections of the building are made for two communication cores at the ends, each core is for exclusive use for clean or dirty circuits. The dirty and clean circuits do not cross on any floor and the connection between them is always through transfers. The transfers are well dimensioned and hierarchical for ease of use. Separating personal and material access. Designed for people: The project places the user (patients, healthcare, and maintenance staff) at the center of its design with an architecture that actively participates in the humanization of healthcare.

The building takes advantage of its location, on the Vallcarca mountain with views over the city, bringing natural light and views into all the spaces, including bathrooms and ICUs. This has a positive effect on patients, maintaining circadian rhythms and their well-being. The interior cladding materials, with the use of wood and different images of nature, help to distance the interior space from the aseptic hospital imaginary.

The lighting is programmed with different scenes, not only separating day and night but also thinking about the comfort of the user, making a gradation between transit spaces and healthcare spaces. Excessive and homogeneous lighting that does not recognize the different intensities and concentrations according to the needs of users is avoided. The installation spaces are always located in a clean area, so that most of the maintenance can be carried out safely for the people who work in them.

More information

Label
Architects
Text
PMMT Arquitectura. Lead architects.- Patricio Martínez González, Maximiá Torruella i Castel, Luis Miguel Gotor Navarra.
+ + copy Created with Sketch.
- + copy Created with Sketch.
Label
Design team
Text
Team Manager.- Susana Aristoy.
+ + copy Created with Sketch.
- + copy Created with Sketch.
Label
Area
Text
4.067m² sqm.
+ + copy Created with Sketch.
- + copy Created with Sketch.
Label
Budget
Text
€13,892,788.
+ + copy Created with Sketch.
- + copy Created with Sketch.
Label
Dates
Text
2020.
+ + copy Created with Sketch.
- + copy Created with Sketch.
Label
Location
Text
Parc Sanitari Pere Virgili, Barcelona, Spain.
+ + copy Created with Sketch.
- + copy Created with Sketch.
Label
Photography
+ + copy Created with Sketch.
- + copy Created with Sketch.

Patricio Martínez, Maximià Torruella, arquitectura, SL provide qualified technical services in the fields of architecture, interior design and urban planning.

Under the group name PMMT writing up architecture projects and competition at the Catalan, Spanish and International level.

To provide a flexible structure able to efficiently co-ordinate the range of processes and experts needed in nowadays architecture projects, consolidating an organization capable of adjusting to the realization of projects of varied complexity.

Read more
Published on: July 6, 2022
Cite: "Flexibility to help health. Uci-Covid Building by PMMT Arquitectura " METALOCUS. Accessed
<http://www.metalocus.es/en/news/flexibility-help-health-uci-covid-building-pmmt-arquitectura> ISSN 1139-6415
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...
Loading content ...