Carlo Rati imagines a hospital campus as an urban landscape
In Brecciathe future of one of the majors of Lombardy healthcare institutions is drawn by a group led by CRA-Carlo Ratti Associati as a campus with gardens, glass wings and public paths.
The winning proposal for the new Main and Children’s Hospital of ASST Spedali Civili di Brescia was unveiled at Teatro Grande, bringing together CRA, Park Associati and Politecnica Building for Humans with Openfabric, DOTDOTDOT, Eckersley O’Callaghan and Studio Matti.
The project, which was selected through an international design competition, redevelops the existing hospital campus through the lens of One Health, connecting medical care with research, landscape and the public realm.
Construction is expected to begin in 2028, and the new facilities will bring together clinical and technology functions on 60,500 square meters and more than 745 beds.
visualization © Park Associati
extending the breccia radial pattern
The design from Carlo Ratti Associates, Park Associatesand Politecnica Building for Humans it begins with engineer Angelo Bordoni’s early twentieth-century masterplan, whose hexagonal core and radial layout shaped the identity of the Spedali Civili campus.
Instead of erasing this structure, the new proposal extends its logic outwards, organizing the Central Hospital as three connected wings that open to the city and frame views of the surrounding mountains. At ground level, a fully glazed lobby faces a new public square, giving the hospital a more visible urban front.
Inside, the project emphasizes daylight, immediate wayfinding, acoustic comfort and views of the Brescia Prealps. Patient rooms are designed with visual links to the landscape, while large glazed conservatories cover the edges of each wing, smoothing the transition between treatment areas and the outdoors.
The facade, developed with Eckersley O’Callaghanmanages solar control and glare while keeping the building visually open.
visualization © Park Associati
CareRing connects treatment, logistics and public space
The Children’s Hospital is configured as an independent building made of rounded volumes of different heights. Its courtyards, terraces and interior gardens bring the outdoors into direct contact with the departments, while the entrance atrium includes play areas, consultation zones and family gathering areas.
The geometry gives the building a distinct identity within the campus, with spaces that are easier to read at a child’s scale.
The strongest spatial movement of the proposal is the CareRing, a continuous route that stretches for more than a kilometer around the campus. Underground, it organizes logistics, services and technical flows away from clinical traffic.
At ground level, it becomes a green system of squares, healing gardens and public paths, designed with Light fabric to connect the hospital to the city while improving biodiversity and the microclimate.
visualization © Park
a timber hospital planned for future change
The new buildings will use a hybrid wood and steel structure assembled through dry construction techniques, reducing embodied carbon while allowing the campus to adapt as medical technologies change.
A digital layer developed with DOTDOTDOT it will support pathfinding, flow management, and environmental monitoring without assuming architectural expertise.
The technical systems are present, but the design keeps attention to the movement, light, landscape and legibility of the campus.
visualization © Park Associati
visualization © Park Associati
