Dean McGee Eye Institute Dedicates World-Class Facility

Oklahoma City, October 24 — Dedication ceremonies for the new Dean McGee Eye Institute were held on September 30th. Architectural Design Group, an award-winning architectural, interiors and program management firm, provided the design for the 78,500-square-foot expansion to the 1975 healthcare and research building. This addition doubled the facility’s research area and nearly doubled clinical space.

In 2002, the Dean McGee Eye Institute held a design competition as the first step in the creation of an iconic expansion. The institute sought a design that would complement rather than ignore the original building and simultaneously express the groundbreaking research taking place within its walls. These goals were achieved in a new structure that echoes the strong design elements of the original building, while softening hard edges with curving forms to create a cohesive overall composition. The marriage of the old with the new creates a high tech composition that identifies the institute as a world-class center for research, teaching and patient care.

Window and structural rhythms emulate the style of the 1975 brutalist building. The sleek, black brick wall that sweeps east from the entry forms a prominent new building face that pays homage to the shape and color of the original curtain wall. The circular atrium softens the blocky original and introduces reflective qualities. The floating sunshade protects the lobby interior from the western sun. The blue glass curtain wall on the east curves with the flow of traffic along a new parking deck and terminates on the southeast with a dramatic slanted brick fin that wraps the building and creates a strong corner.

The four-story atrium lobby serves as the central reception area for the entire building, guiding patients into an open waiting area where they are directed to appointments and procedures. Finishes, such as wooden beams overhead and patterned flooring underfoot, splay out from the circular reception area to symbolize the rods and cones of the human eye. Curved bridges span the atrium linking the new clinical research areas to the existing building. Portions of the brick and concrete exterior of the original are preserved within the expansion and blend with the color and textures of the new finishes, achieving an overall balance and cohesion of color, pattern and form.

This large expansion marks a momentous achievement in the history of the institute and makes the facility one of the largest eye institutes in the nation. Many prominent dignitaries were on hand as guest speakers at the dedication including: Dr. Paul Sieving, Director of the National Eye Institute & National Institutes of Health; Dr. David Parke II, Executive Vice President and CEO of the American Academy of Ophthalmology and former President and CEO of the Dean McGee Eye Institute; James Tolbert III, Dean McGee Board of Trustees Chair; Dr. M. Dewayne Andrews, Senior Vice President and Provost of the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center and Executive Dean of the OU College of Medicine; and the Honorable James Lankford, Congressman from Oklahoma’s Fifth Congressional District.

For more information on Architectural Design Group, contact Anne-Marie Funk, Director of Business Development at 405.232.5700, email: afunk@adgokc.com. See project details and additional photos in ADG’s “Our Work” section: www.adgokc.com/our-work/healthcare/dean-mcgee-eye-institute.

For more information on the Dean McGee Eye Institute visit their web site at: www.dmei.org or contact Melody Marcum at 405.271.6005.

Photos by Brian Hines - Architectural Design Group