Healthy buildings

I attended the Museums Association Conference this week, the annual 3 day bash held this year at the QEII Conference Centre in London. It does what it says on the tin, that building. But it's oh, so cold and clinical in its deliberate efficiency. A colleague and I visited the loo together at one point, a quick break from the relentless programme of talks and seminars. As we clattered into the small room, we gasped in pleasure. From the window on that 5th floor was a sweeping vista over the undulating, green-tiled roof of the old Middlesex Guildhall, now the new Supreme Court, to the concertina of silver grey, Gothic arches of Westminster Abbey. We laughed and chatted together then as we scrubbed our hands, dutifully following the hygiene instructions now slapped on every public toilet in the wake of Swine Flu. That snatched Westminster view undoubtedly raised our spirits, ready for re-entry to the conference fray.

I was reminded of this happy interlude this morning. On one of my favourite Radio 4 programmes, Broadcasting House, there was an article on the soon to be awarded Stirling Prize for Architecture. The discussion centred on the 2 shortlisted buildings in the health sector, Maggie's Centre at the Charing Cross Hospital in Hammersmith from the Richard Rogers partnership and the Kentish Town Health Centre from the architecture practice Allford Hall Monaghan Morris. Was it true, they wondered, that buildings can promote good health? "Of course they can!", I shouted at the radio. Phrases such as "the building envelopes me in love" and "I feel re-connected and healed here" were testiment to the obvious truth that we need to cure the spirit as well as the body. And I was grateful for just a spoonful of that precious medicine in Westminster this week.