Francis Cauffman designed the new 241,000 SF West Wing addition for Saint Barnabas Medical Center in Livingston, NJ, working with the Medical Center to establish a comprehensive response to its growing maternity needs. The expansion, which includes a 75,000 SF renovation, introduces a wide range of diagnostic and treatment spaces and provides 100% private room availability for patients. The specialized obstetrics center manages complex pregnancies and post-birth care, which is not common in a community hospital.

The design approach focused on three main components: frame, transparency and identity. The frame unifies the building and creates a solid transition towards the back elevation. Its clean, elegant approach to massing breaks down the otherwise imposing scale and highlights the distribution of open, airy social spaces within the building. The side and back façade are made from a masonry material that frames the main entry and accentuates the lightness of the lobby, offering a contrasting play of textures and added visual interest.

The transparent two-story lobby is the focal point of the building, from both inside and outside. Its glass construction draws the eye into the facility and creates a welcoming, comfortable space for patients and visitors. The focus on sunlight and organic, curving structural features eases visitors into their experience of the building, in contrast to the institutional, claustrophobic nature of many hospital waiting spaces. In addition, the new lobby seamlessly connects the existing facilities with the new addition, helping visitors orient themselves. A two-story focal wall with natural imagery takes full advantage of the lobby’s height. A balcony on the second floor offers an alternative, more intimate seating area for sensitive conversations.

The new program emphasizes privacy and personal patient experience. The design provides completely private rooms for patients. This design feature preserves patient confidentiality while supporting the decreased infection rates attributable to closed, individual accommodations. The West Wing addition will have state-of-the-art neonatal intensive care facilities, including many private rooms. Alternately, pod rooms offer patients all the benefits of a private room, while providing the opportunity for socialization and support between parents of patients in the NICU. 

Every patient will be prepared for surgery in a private space. This means that family can now be alone with the patient both before and after surgery, with immediate access to support in post-surgical care planning. Four new operating rooms will be able to accommodate large tables for complicated spinal and neuro-surgical procedures.  One room will have the immediate capacity to function as a hybrid room, thus facilitating minimally-invasive procedures.

The tone of the finishes established by the lobby will carry through the interior building design – themes repeat within clinical spaces, creating a unified aesthetic that explicitly ties the caregiving process to the social context in which it exists. This design also coheres with the Medical Center’s existing structures, referencing shape and material patterns in order to better blend into the overall character of the campus. The proposed design updates the St. Barnabas brand and creates a natural transition between the new wing and the old.