![\"RVCpic\"](\"http:\/\/blogs.library.mcgill.ca\/osler-library\/files\/2013\/03\/RVCpic-856x1024.jpg\")
Royal Victoria Hospital inkwell. Photo by Don Toromanoff.<\/p><\/div>\n
A new exhibition highlighting the contributions of physicians to hospital architecture is up now at the Osler Library.<\/p>\n
Designing Doctors<\/i> showcases the Osler Library\u2019s outstanding collection of architectural advice literature on hospital architecture.\u00a0\u00a0 Its focus is on the development of the so-called pavilion-plan hospital, a ubiquitous typology for hospitals in the English-speaking world in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries which maximized ventilation and daylight; their signature detail, however, was the Nightingale ward, a large, open space which typically housed about thirty patients.<\/p>\n
Two sub-themes shape the organization of the exhibition:\u00a0 the role of physicians in the design of pavilion-plan hospitals and the position of hospitals as tourist destinations.\u00a0 Consequently, Designing Doctors<\/i> presents a series of classic books written by doctor-architect teams or physicians who saw themselves as architectural experts. Several of these books are dedicated by or to famous figures, including Florence Nightingale, Henry Saxon Snell, and Edward Fletcher Stevens. \u00a0Included here too are delightful souvenir items featuring hospital imagery:\u00a0 an inkwell, a soup bowl, hospital postcards, and a humorous board game as reminders of the wide reach of hospital architecture images in twentieth-century popular culture.<\/p>\n
The exhibition is curated by Professor Annmarie Adams<\/a>, Director of the School of Architecture<\/a>, McGill University, and member of the Osler Library\u2019s Board of Curators.<\/p>\n Through August 2013.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A new exhibition highlighting the contributions of physicians to hospital architecture is up now at the Osler Library. Designing Doctors showcases the Osler Library\u2019s outstanding collection of architectural advice literature on hospital architecture.\u00a0\u00a0 Its focus is on the development … Continue reading