THE HEALING ARTS
11 Sep 2017
A structural healing pavilion forms the centrepiece of a new landscape on the grounds of a LA hospital, providing shade and seating in the sculptural form that offers respite for visitors and patients.
Ball-Nogues Studio has completed the Healing Pavilion, a structure that provides shade and seating within the new garden of the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, USA. The pavilion was created using 851 metres of 5cm-diameter mild steel tubing. In total, 352 individual components were precisely bent with a computer numerically controlled rolling system. Together, the tubes form an occupiable structural shell with no extraneous elements. 
Importantly, the pavilion’s intricate patterns, and the shadows they cast on the ground, are meant to capture the imagination and temporarily transport the visitor’s mind away from illness. Gaston Nogues of Ball-Nogues Studio is quoted as saying, “The irregularity of the tubes create a layer of transparency that provides a semi-sheltered and a very meaningful place for patients and guests to relax. It could also work as a shading device, but mainly it is an experience that symbolises hope.” 
Healing Pavilion has been designed for both individual occupation and to be shared with another person. “It explores the challenges of bending and rolling tube steel to form a design in the shape of a shell,” says Benjamin Ball. “The result features pretty unique three-dimensional curvature of the steel, where each piece is at a fixed distance to its neighbor.” 
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Images by Sibylle Allgaier
