Designing better mental healthcare facilities

Part of the ‘toolkit’ to help young people recover

James Christian, an architect and director, and Creative strategist and director, Megan Charnley, report on the practice’s design of the interior of the CAMHS unit at Edinburgh’s new Royal Hospital for Children and Young People.

James Christian, an architect and director of multidisciplinary architecture and design studio, Projects Office, and his colleague, Creative strategist and director, Megan Charnley, report on the practice’s design of the interior of the CAMHS unit at Edinburgh’s new Royal Hospital for Children and Young People. They explain that ‘through a user-centred design approach’, they produced ‘a collaboratively developed and cohesive set of designs which push the boundaries of established thought about mental healthcare environments’. 

Edinburgh’s new Royal Hospital for Children and Young People (RHCYP) brings together departments from across the city into a new purpose-built building. Following an open competition run by Ginkgo Projects, our architectural practice, Projects Office, was appointed to design the interiors of the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) unit within the new hospital, including outpatient areas, courtyards, and inpatient facilities, for children aged from 5 to 18 years’ old. Through a user-centred design approach, we produced a collaboratively developed and cohesive set of designs which push the boundaries of established thought about mental healthcare environments. It was a great pleasure to create these vibrant and unconventional healing spaces with the input, support, and enthusiasm of NHS staff, patients, and families, and in this article we will discuss how the project was developed, and some of the key things we learned along the way.

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