In September 1998 JDDK were appointed to provide design services for a major capital project at St Gemma’s Hospice in Leeds. St Gemma’s was established in the 1970’s with purpose designed buildings adjacent to a 19th Century private house with a mature garden setting, something of an oasis in suburban north Leeds. The original hospice buildings no longer met the needs of modern palliative care standards and had out of date construction standards.

The brief was to put together an extensive programme of works to bring the existing buildings up to modern standards and provide new build facilities where necessary whilst maintaining continuity of hospice services and minimising expenditure.

The proposals included provision of a mixture of single bedded and four bedded rooms with ensuite facilities and the reorganisation of the hospice grounds to provide a tranquil private garden for patients with a conservatory.

Works also included phased replacement of building services, upgrading the existing building fabric to high performance standards as well as creating additional car parking and vehicular servicing areas. Work on site started in 2000 and completed in 2003 to a contract sum of £3.6m.

JDDK have worked with St Gemma’s over the years on many small projects to keep their facilities up to date and most recently refurbished the bedrooms to accommodate new bedheads that conceal a high level of state of the art medical servicing whilst creating a comfortable environment for the patient.