Legacy ER at Allen
1310 West Exchange Parkway, Allen, Texas 75013
2-story, 8,500 SF, hybrid emergency and urgent care
Program
Healthcare, 8,500 SF
Emergency Room
Urgent Care
CT Scan
X-Ray
Build
New
FEMCF
TX DSHS
JCAHO
Client
Intuitive Health
Legacy ER & Urgent Care
Service
Architect
Interior Designer
Compacting the programs of a state-licensed emergency facility and a common urgent care clinic, Legacy ER aims to redefine the medical care experience. The architecture explores the spatially expressible relationship between the clinical administration of medicine and the emotional relation between the medical professional, the patient, and the healing environment.
The building integrates the principles of Evidence-Based Design and Sustainability within its spatial, circulatory, and sensory structure. The components of workspaces were designed for peer collaboration, patient accessibility, and data privacy. Patient care areas were crafted for hospitality and treatment efficacy.
The exterior enclosure is an architectural robe of perforated zinc panels with integrated lighting system. The folding panels were seamed to maintain continuous readings of the vertical standing seams. The edge detailing of the panels create zero edges and suggests flight, lightness, precision, and speed.
Relating in contrast to the precise geometries of the exterior, the interior spaces are designed to blur edges and to receive daylight and artificial light softly. Multiple skylights are situated at strategic intersections of the circulatory loop to form a sensible system of way-finding and apertures to the outdoor. The atmospheric quality of the interior continually morphs in response to the natural climatic conditions. The detailing of the interior skylights reads as frameless apertures that puncture the zinc exterior paneling.
As an effect, the building achieves an engaging balance between the aggressive, vigilant presence on the exterior and a tranquil interior ambience, offering a soothing place of respite for patients seeking medical care under distressed conditions.
This is a second building by 5G Studio Collaborative for the same client, Legacy ER. The first building, located in Frisco, Texas was featured on Arch Record online BTS on August 4, 2011. The success of the first building's design, and the exceptional branding and business opportunities it enabled, convinced the client to push forward with an edgy contemporary design to advance the discourse on the design of healing environment.
10 years after opening, the building was honored as one of twenty-five winning projects of The Dallas Architecture Forum 25th Anniversary Design Recognition Awards, an awards program that celebrates twenty-five projects of significance that have improved the social and urban fabric of North Texas since The Forum was founded twenty-five years ago.
Awards
2023 Dallas Architecture Forum 25th Anniversary Design Recognition Awards, Health and Wellness
2014 National AIA/AAH (American Institute of Architects’ Academy of Architecture for Health) Healthcare Design Awards
2014 IIDA (International Interior Design Association) Healthcare Interior Design Awards, Best of Category-Ambulatory Care Centers/Outpatient Clinics
2015 Contract Magazine's 36th annual Interiors Awards, Sole winner in Healthcare
2014 Interior Design Magazine's Best of Year Awards, Honoree in Healthcare
2013 American Institute of Architects-Dallas Chapter, Unbuilt Design Awards
2015 ArchDaily Building Of The Year Nominee, Healthcare
2014 Metal Architecture Design Awards, Metal Roofing
2014 MCA (Metal Construction Association) Chairman’s Awards, Overall Excellence
Publications
Architectural Record, May 2014
“Roadside Attraction: Legacy ER, a freestanding emergency room and urgent-care facility stops traffic with an angular folded roof of zinc panels and perforated screens," Mark Lamster; one of four buildings selected from an international pool of healthcare projects to be featured in the Healthcare Building Type Study.
ARCHITECT, August 2014 Lede
AIA Announces 2014 Healthcare Design Awards," Deane Madsen
Dallas Morning News, April 2014 Lede
“Architecture: Two local clinics take a fresh approach to emergency rooms," Mark Lamster
Contract Magazine, January/February 2015
"Interiors Awards: Healthcare - Legacy ER & Urgent Care," Jean Nayar
CNN Style, June 2017
"Hospital designs that are changing the way you're cared for," Elizabeth Stamp; one of seventeen selected international projects
Domus, June 2014
AIA Academy of Architecture for Health, Research Initiatives Committee Case Study Analysis.
World Health Design, October 2014 Cover
"Placemaker: Forward Legacy," Andrew Sansom
ArchDaily, July 2014, AD Editorial Team Selected Works
Architect's Newspaper, August 2014
"5G Studio wraps Legacy ER in a Zinc Robe," Anna Bergren Miller
Healthcare Design, December 2014
"Lighting Up the ED with Nature," Anne DiNardo
Modern Steel Construction, July 2017
"Structurally Sound: Urgent Care with Flair"
World Architecture News, June 2014
"5G Studio Collaborative leave their legacy on Allen, Texas with zinc-clad healthcare centre," Sian Disson; selected as EcoWAN Project
Designboom, August 2014
"5G Studio folds angular roof over Legacy ER in Allen, Texas," Trent Fredrickson
SNAP (Sweets News and Products), January/February 2015, Profile Interview
"Yen Ong: Making Design Humanistic," Sheila Kim
American-Architects Review by World Architects, State-by-State 50x50 Building of the Week, October 2014
Metal Architecture magazine, July 2014
“A Box Transformed: The dynamic, folded roof of a suburban medical facility delivers beauty and superior design," Paul Deffenbaugh
Architectural Digest, August 2014 Lede
"The Doctor is In; the Best of Healthcare Design," Asad Syrkett
Healthcare Design, October 2014
2014 IIDA Healthcare Interior Design Competition's Best of Category Winners feature
Metal Construction Association, Case Study, 2014
"Zinc: The Right Call in an Emergency."
Metal Construction News, December 2014
"Healing Design Freestanding medical facility sets a paradigm of emergency medical care architecture," Marcy Marro
Design And Build With Metal, July 2014
"RHEINZINK Panels Provide Ultra-Contemporary Design For Unique Free-Standing ER Concept."
ON magazine, March 2014
“How Legacy ER & Urgent Care is Doing Healthcare Differently”
Quotes
“An alternative to this grim state of affairs, with broad implications for emergency medical care across the nation, may be found along an unremarkable stretch of parkway in Allen. Here, standing out in the sprawl of cookie-cutter housing developments and strip-mall chain stores, is an object that seems delivered from the realm of science fiction, a mechanical insect of folded zinc planes, jutting angles and perforated screens.”
Mark Lamster, architecture critic of Dallas Morning News and recipient of Texas Society of Architects’ Flowers Medal for promotion of Architecture through Media, wrote in Dallas Morning News lede article titled “The Design Cure”
“This architectural response to a straight-forward planning solution is an exciting vision of how good design represents the intent of a building. . . . The result is a fresh and innovative solution to freestanding urgent care centers and emergency rooms.”
Jury Remark in awarding the project the AIA/AAH National Healthcare Design Award
“What was immediately apparent was the completeness of the solution, striving to address every room with the same level of attention to aesthetics, materials, and detailing. The design is pushing boundaries.”
Jury remark in awarding Contract Magazine’s Interiors Award
“What will the future of American medical care look like? One answer to that question lies amid the suburban sprawl of Allen, Texas, a bedroom community sprouting from the tawny prairie land some 30 miles north of downtown Dallas. . . . For both physicians and patients, the design represents a considerable improvement over the status quo. The typology, moreover, has the capacity to significantly improve access to care, if various regulatory issues are satisfied. As these facilities continue to proliferate, Legacy ER is a welcome example that other freestanding clinics might do well to follow.”
Mark Lamster, architecture critic of Dallas Morning News and Loeb Fellow at the Harvard Graduate School of Design, wrote in Architectural Record magazine, titled “Roadside Attraction: Legacy ER, a freestanding emergency room and urgent-care facility stops traffic”