To incorporate this language into the design of the medical center, NBBJ's design team worked with a Native Cultural Design Committee. Dallam and his team relied on several models to illustrate the project for the committee, as well as a variety of visual impressions, including photographs taken by Alaskan Natives and noted nature photographer, Art Wolfe. Thankfully though, the Natives I was with knew exactly where we were. But this same visual acuity that sustains them in nature made it difficult to understand the type of abstract drawings architects often use to communicate the design of a new building. So, the models and photographs became essential in communicating ideas that we would incorporate in the design.
Native artwork is integrated throughout the facility's interiors.
Here, wood carved snow geese take flight around the Spirit House lobby. By blending the input from the design committee and others with their own research and personal experiences, the NBBJ team came up with a number of important elements of design for the Alaska Native Medical Center. First, NBBJ used the concept of a village for the center's organizational scale. The building steps back to the north on the building site, thus allowing daylight to flood the interior through carefully placed hallways and windows. This concept helps reduce the apparent scale of the building, which has the potential to be quite intimidating to people from small villages.