Yeovil Ophthalmology – Phase 1

Yeovil Ophthalmology Centre is part of a new movement where the NHS Foundation Trust are looking to move ophthalmology services away from clinical hospital sites into better suited, and accessible areas, to improve their service delivery. This not only frees up valuable space within hospitals, but also benefits the service users where they are given a better, faster, more accessible treatment with reduced wait times. Quattro’s brief called for careful consideration into the layout in order to enable a better, more efficient, patient flow between each of the individual rooms. Quattro’s carefully considered design means the progression of the treatment rooms is aligned with the progression of the different services the users require. The Trust also required private areas for staff to change and have breaks as well as separate toilet facilities for the public too.

The service at Yeovil was chosen to relocate to the Quedam Shopping Centre, in Yeovil town centre, where an empty shopping unit was refurbished to meet the demanding environment needed. The existing building, like many others, had its own series of challenges, which our design team worked tirelessly to overcome.

The unit is enclosed both sides with limited natural lighting, the existing floor has a sloped gradient running down from the main high street towards the back of the unit. This provided a challenge where safe accessibility needed to be carefully considered and a design needed to create a light airy environment where services users and staff are happy to use.

Quattro’s design solution was to create a central ‘high street’ within the unit, where each side acted as its own individual lane branching off from the core. This created a natural flow where people intuitively know where to go and how to progress to the next room. We intelligently designed the main space to ensure people with reduced or impaired mobility and disabilities were able to use the space safely and confidently without assistance. We designed the branching rooms to step down the ramp, meaning every entrance had a level threshold to the ramp itself.

The interior design was a key aspect to get right; the lack of natural lighting within the treatment area called for a design which allowed the spread of light through bright surfaces. Quattro utilised a clever combination of darker flooring and wall tops as a contrasting design feature to break up plains and aid towards wayfinding and differentiation of spaces.

The half-height walls were a new design concept Quattro introduced to the Trust. Through previous research, and implementation in similar projects, this innovative solution was proposed as an ideal way to keep the unit open, allowing shared light between spaces whilst maintaining privacy in the individual booths. This was a key design feature which has contributed to the successful nature of this project in providing a clinical, bright and airy environment.