Royal Preston Hospital RPU
The original site for the RPU at Preston was to have been in a courtyard in the centre of the hospital. Following a review of the feasibility of the proposal, Scott Tallon Walker suggested that the building could be incorporated into the green belt around the perimeter of the hospital site located beside the main entrance to RMH (Sutton) and the steeply sloping site gave the solution. The Radio-Pharmaceutical project at the Royal Marsden Hospital involved both a GMP production facility and a research centre for the Institute of Cancer Research.
Client
Erigal UK
Location
Preston, United Kingdom
Status
In Use
Area
760
Expertise
The production facility is entered at first floor level from the east end of the building while the research facility is entered at ground level from the Westside, and in this way potential conflicts are eliminated by use of the section. A stepped louvred colonnade to the south of the building serves to modify and control both light and heat.
This advanced radiopharmaceutical unit - to manufacture FDG (18F-Fludeoxyglucose), one of the most commonly used tracers in PET imaging - contains at its core, the cyclotron bunker, hot cells and plant areas, designed to cGMP standards.
The scheme which is incorporated into the green belt around the perimeter of the hospital site is as much about landscaping as it is architecture. It has proved very successful in visual terms as well as passing its radiological and pharmaceutical inspections on first review.