Health and leisure 

Technology, understanding, and research is changing the way we approach health and wellbeing across the globe. Embracing prevention, alongside treatment and care, through place and space has become increasingly important for the health and leisure sector, including the NHS, local councils and private sector partners. Bringing teams together to collaborate removes the barriers to services, putting prevention and rehabilitation at the top of the agenda.

Performing places 

We design and deliver spaces that encourage people to move, with integrated services and support systems, alongside specialist spaces that deliver treatment and care. 

Today’s health and wellbeing environments must be smart, energy efficient and flexible to change.  

With cross-sector expertise covering the full delivery spectrum, our specialist team works with public and private sector clients and end users innovatively and collaboratively at every stage of the building lifecycle.

From feasibility to post-occupancy, we use tailored, agile thinking to create places where communities can flourish long into the future. Our people bring regional expertise to a national offering, and our in-house capability is revolutionising how health and wellbeing spaces are designed, put together and operated.

Prevention: Integrating health and leisure sector services 

Our partnership with Alliance Leisure is taking the integration of health and wellbeing to the next level. Together, we build places that encourage people to move, spaces that foster collaboration between services and health bodies, and ultimately buildings that are at the forefront of the health sector’s prevention strategy. 

With £9.5bn of social value in health improvements already being delivered through the 3,000 public leisure sector facilities in the UK, alongside 66% of cancer prehab and rehabilitation, the opportunity to tackle the crisis is now.  

Physical inactivity is associated with one in six deaths in the UK and is estimated to cost the UK £7.4 billion annually (including £0.9 billion to the NHS alone). Unfortunately, our population is around 20% less active than in the 1960s. If current trends continue, it will be 35% less active by 2030.

Through projects like Alliance Leisure’s Knaresborough Health and Wellness Centre, we are working with local authorities to deliver integrated health solutions. At Knaresborough, GP referrals to the leisure centre have increased by 144%, alongside a 60% increase in the number of children learning to swim in the first three months. 

Sports, stadia and leisure facilities have a hugely positive impact in the way people engage with and embrace movement, whether they are athletes competing for a gold medal, children watching their favourite sport, or someone recovering from an injury or illness.

Treatment and care: high-performing facilities 

We understand the need for flexible, cost-effective health facilities that attract the best talent. This could be a top-of-the-range research facility driving the latest advancements in medical technology – such as University College London’s (UCL) new £300m home of Neuroscience, where we installed the world’s most advanced MRI scanners. A flexible large-scale hospital design and construction build such as The Oak Cancer Centre at London’s The Royal Marsden NHS Trust. Or a deep retrofit of an existing building to deliver teaching spaces to train doctors and nurses of the future, like our project at School of Healthcare Sciences for Cardiff University. 

Building high-quality health sector environments in a city, office or underused location can be a big challenge – but it doesn’t have to be. Our work with healthcare estates and facilities professionals has seen us use the latest technology to help clients transform existing office buildings in complex locations into industry-leading healthcare environments, as seen with Schoen Clinic.

Sustainability in health: A prescription for a long and healthy legacy

It’s paramount that the health and wellbeing spaces which serve our communities are as healthy as possible, and that requires facilities that are future-proofed, accessible and sustainable.

In our DNA lies a commitment to securing legacies for the communities in which we work, and we’re leading on a brighter, more sustainable future – it’s what makes us unique, and why customers return.

As a leading provider with a portfolio featuring multi award-winning spaces, we deliver the health, leisure and wellbeing environments of tomorrow – today. 

Leisure facilities are often the largest emitters in the public sector estate. Through early engagement, often before the design stage, we have been able to deliver significant in-use carbon reductions at sports facilities across the UK. Our Manchester National Cycling Centre refurbishment should see a reduction of 517 tCO2 per year, while six Public Sector Decarbonisation Scheme (PSDS) projects delivered a combined average of 61% reduction in carbon emissions, a 15.1% reduction in energy costs and a 97.6% decrease in gas use.

Across our leisure, health and wellbeing projects, we work with clients at the very start of their design journey to reduce emissions through sustainable construction and beyond, with impressive results.