Chicagoland Children’s Health Alliance –
Pediatric Outpatient Center
Wilmette, Illinois
IIDA RED Award Winner – Healthcare (2021); Featured in Healthcare Snapshots, Healthcare Design Showcase, and Healthcare Design Remodel and Renovation Gallery
Advocate Children’s Hospital, Endeavor Health, and UChicago Medicine Comer Children’s Hospital formed a strategic partnership, the Chicagoland Children’s Health Alliance, to expand wide-ranging pediatric care in Illinois. As part of the strategic alliance, Eckenhoff Saunders led the conversion of a former two-story furniture store located in Edens Plaza in Wilmette, Illinois, into a new pediatric care center.
Patients, staff, and visitors are greeted by a playfully designed crosswalk leading to a newly redesigned entrance and canopy. The 34,000 sf facility includes immediate care, physical and occupational therapy, an outpatient lab, radiology, and approximately 30 universal exam rooms.
Clinical areas are grouped into four pods distinguished by color schemes centered around various nature settings. Each floor has a waiting area linked by an open staircase within a forest-like interior behind the new multi-story pleated curtain wall. These waiting areas include abstract tree elements, natural materials, and spaces of various scales for kids of all ages. The goal throughout the project was to create positive distractions that invite young patients’ intellectual curiosity.