Warneford Park Masterplan

On behalf of Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust, Eric Parry Architects has submitted a hybrid planning application for the major renewal of the Warneford Hospital site in Headington to the east of Oxford city centre.

Warneford Park will provide a new, pre-eminent mental health hospital alongside a research and innovation centre.  This research centre will aim to tackle some of the most important issues in mental health by discovering new drug therapies, and new forms of treatment.  A new generation of research will link fundamental discoveries to new clinical practices, treatments and globally scalable pharmaceutical products, faster than ever before.

Eric Parry Architects’ proposal repurposes the existing grade II-listed hospital buildings on the site, converting them into a new graduate college of the University of Oxford. New accommodation and ancillary buildings will provide facilities that will include en-suite rooms for 270 students, academic offices, meeting rooms and teaching spaces, a performance and rehearsal space, a dining hall, informal study spaces and a library.

To the east of the site, new buildings totalling 685,000 sq ft will provide a new purpose-built mental health hospital and a medical research centre. The operations of Warneford Hospital will continue uninterrupted while the building project is carried out, with patients and staff transferring from the old listed buildings when construction work is complete. The listed buildings will then be converted to the new graduate college.

Working with landscape architects Todd Longstaffe-Gowan, the plans propose a revitalised landscape led masterplan to create an exceptional environment for healthcare, medical research and education.

The new buildings will have a palette of natural materials, including unglazed terracotta, pre-cast concrete, stone and timber, that will sit harmoniously alongside the listed buildings. The setting and design of the new buildings will maximise the availability of natural light to provide exemplary accommodation in the hospital spaces, the offices and laboratories of the research centre and the new college facilities.