Assemble reveals design for Maggie's Centre in Kent
Architecture collective Assemble has received planning permission for a Maggie's Centre at Maidstone Hospital, which will feature pitched volumes informed by Kent's local culture and landscape.
Like all centres created by the Maggie's charity, Maggie's Kent will aim to provide support to cancer patients and their families in a more homely setting than a typical hospital.
Set to be built in the grounds of Maidstone Hospital, the centre will contain a welcoming kitchen area, rooms for one-to-one cancer support, and larger spaces for group gatherings and exercise classes.
Designed to appear familiar to local visitors, Assemble referenced Kent's culture, landscape, geology and heritage when creating the building.
Natural and local materials will be used to build the centre, which is expected to support 20,000 annual visitors once it is complete in 2028.
Images of the design show white-rendered volumes topped with tiled, pitched roofs punctured with skylights.
The interior will feature stone block walls, exposed timber roofs, wood-panelled surfaces and large windows overlooking the garden space, which will be designed by landscape architects J&L Gibbons.
"Maggie's are special places that enable their staff and volunteers to deliver extraordinary work," said Assemble architect Anthony Engi-Meacock.
"It is a privilege to be part of a team who believe in and demonstrate the value of design to create uplifting spaces that nourish those who inhabit them."
Founded by Maggie Keswick Jencks and Charles Jencks, Maggie's has commissioned some of the world's most famous architects to design its centres, including Norman Foster, Zaha Hadid, Richard Rogers and Frank Gehry.
An exhibition of Maggie's 30-year history recently opened at the V&A Dundee, exhibiting drawings and models of its centres.
It is hoped that Maggie's Kent will continue the charity's legacy and its pursuit to provide cancer care support across the UK.
"This incredible milestone comes as we mark 30 years of providing trailblazing expert support across the UK and look towards the next three decades of Maggie's," said Maggie's CEO Laura Lee.
"Our Kent centre is progressing towards our ambition to have 60 centres across the UK, so no one faces cancer alone."
The latest Maggie's Centres to be built include the Northampton centre, which features an angular metal roof designed by Stephen Marshall Architects, and a curving centre in London designed by Studio Libeskind.
The renders are by Assemble and Nora Walter Images.
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