The Alder Centre

by Allford Hall Monaghan Morris

Client The Alder Hey Children's NHS Foundation Trust

Award RIBA North West Award 2024, RIBA North West Client of the Year

The Alder Centre is a new, standalone building within the Alder Hey Children’s Hospital, Liverpool. Providing a unique health service, it offers support for bereaved parents, and now also operates a nationwide phoneline, allowing callers to talk to counsellors from anywhere in the country. The building’s purpose is to promote companionship and to offer a place of sanctuary.

The architects have designed it as an interpretation of a domestic house, with a living room space at its heart and counselling rooms at the scale of bedrooms unfolding from that core. There is a simple but enveloping warmth to the building. It provides spaces for both individual contemplation as well as togetherness and support, with comforting ease. In its modest way, it fulfils the most fundamental need – to acknowledge and share grief while finding ways to celebrate life.

Read the full citation from the RIBA Awards Jury on RIBA Journal.

Contractor Whitefield and Brown

Structural Engineer Elliott Wood

Quantity Surveyor / Cost Consultant PT Projects

Landscape Architect BBUK

Gross internal area m² 320