Ronald McDonald House

St. John’s, NL

The Ronald McDonald House provides a home away from home for families to stay when their child is sick or injured and in the hospital.  The building is located on the western ground of the Health Sciences Centre in walking distance to the Janeway Child Health Centre.  The facility includes 15 suites that are either hotel like double rooms or like a small apartment for larger stays.  Unlike a hotel or apartment building there is a lot of shared space including a large shared kitchen, dining room, TV room, playroom, teen room, library and other quiet spaces.

The architecture is a sharp contrast to the other institutional buildings nearby.  There is a large canopy which welcomes guests and provides an area sheltered from the weather for people getting in and out of vehicles.  The building has pitched roofs and a textured form making it  feel more like a home than the adjacent health care facilities.  The building is sited away from the hospitals in a sheltered area on the edge of Pippy Park.  During the design we tried to site the building so the views out of the room were towards the Park instead of other buildings or the road.

STATUS: Completed 2012
SERVICES PROVIDED: Prime Consultant, Architectural Design, Interior Design
BUILDING TYPE: New Construction
BUDGET: $6,500,000
PROGRAM: Temporary Stay Hostel
SIZE: 16,600 ft² (1,542 m²)
DESIGN TEAM: Structural and Civil Engineering – Acuren Group Inc, Mechanical and Electrical Engineering – Quadratec Consulting Engineers
PHOTOGRAPHY: Ronald MacDonald House and Fougere Menchenton Architecture