Nanjing Drum tower Hospital / Lemanarc SA

Architects: Lemanarc SA
Location: Zhongshan North Road & Drum Tower Square, Gulou, Nanjing,
Jiangsu, China, 210008
Architect in Charge: Vincent Zhengmao Zhang
Area: 230000.0 sqm
Project Year: 2012
Photographs: Courtesy of Lemanarc SA

Site Plan
The earlier expansions of the hospital was driven by the of development of modern
medical technology as well as the increasing municipal population. Despite the
remarkable scales, most of these early expansions are hardly more than simple and
urgent addition and extension of existing function to meet the rapidly increasing
need for medical service. As a result, the functional layout of many floors are not
well organized and streamlined for the operation of the hospital as a whole. For
instance, the existing outpatient department is on the east side of Zhongshan Rd,
connected with the main buildings of the hospital, which is on the west side, only
through a narrow underground passageway, which makes extra inconvenience to
both patients and staffs.
In the year 2004, in answering the rapidly surging demand for medical service by a
larger and wealthier municipal population, Drumtower hospital planned to
implement a new expansion using a 32,000 sqm site between Zhongshan Rd. and
Tianjin Rd. The expansion project will also be followed by a reorganization and
overhaul of the existing layout and functions.
After many discussion and consultation with the hospital client, our design team led
by Vincent Zhang helped in making a insightful long-term developing project.
According to the project, a total of 2800 beds will be served, of which 1600 is
provided by the new expansion. Daily outpatient is planned to reach 10,000 person.
And the overall gross floor area of the hospital is 230,00 m2.

Scalewise, the project is in fact equal to the GFA of the 420m, 88-floor Jinmao Tower,
the highest building of China back then. But contrary to the general expectation of a
high rise hospital building, we made a seemingly surprising choice: instead of
stacking floors one upon another and resulting in a high floor area ratio, we decided
to lay it down to create a series of gardens at the floor area ratio of 5.2. Such
preference for low rise building went squarely against the design trend at that time,
which is dominated by the frenzy for skyscrapers. But seen at present, it is quite
sure that we have made a right decision, for the low rise plan not only reduced the
stress on vertical trafficwhich is a constant trouble for large general hospitals, but
also creates large areas of urban space with human scales.

Cite:"Nanjing Drum tower Hospital / Lemanarc SA" 26 Dec 2013. ArchDaily.

Accessed 14 Aug 2015. <http://www.archdaily.com/461173/nanjing-drum-towerhospital-lemanarc-sa/>