Callen-Lorde Community Health Center

Mental Health & Primary Care Clinic

The new Callen-Lorde Community Health Center satellite clinic combines two separate but related disciplines on two floors in an 8-story, turn-of-the-century loft building in Chelsea in New York City. The new off-site practice houses a mental health facility on the 5th floor and a primary care clinic on the 4th floor. The health center sought to develop a site that would meet the very different regulatory requirements of the two practices which included occupying separate spaces. Through design, a seamless experience is created for patients accessing their behavioral and medical care. The setting provides licensed medical care and mental health with case managers floating between the two spaces ensuring that patients receive both services and that there is no conflict between the treatment plans or therapeutic regimens.

The square layout of the 5th floor has service spaces along the east and west party walls with consultation rooms along the north and south window walls. Channel glass partitions along the corridors allow natural light to enter deep into the facility. The channel glass provides the necessary acoustical and visual privacy required for psychotherapy while maintaining a robust surface for the occasional patient impact. Upon entering, a linear waiting room under a lowered blue ceiling sits opposite the reception desk and large group room. With its distinctive circular perforated doors the multi-purpose meeting room is divisible into two smaller group rooms and opens up completely to the waiting area for larger events. The cork floors and exposed, surface-mounted light fixtures with the adjacent baffle ceilings are intended to give the new mental health facility a warm and modern atmosphere antithetical to typical institutional healthcare design. A complement of cool and calming blues were employed to complete the palette.

The primary care clinic comprises half of the 4th floor. Intended to serve the patients of the mental health facility one floor above, a similar palette of materials was employed in the design. Exam rooms line the south facing wall with clerestory windows allowing natural light to enter the corridor and interior exam rooms across the hall. Strong graphics and a baffle ceiling along with similarly blue-colored wall and ceiling planes provide a distinct look for the facility which is in harmony with the mental health facility on the floor above.

Awards and Publications:

2018       AIANY Interiors Speed Presentation Selection