Critical Care Healing Garden
This page was last updated: April 14th, 2022
Critical Care Healing Garden
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The Critical Care Healing Garden at Royal Cornwall Hospital will soon begin construction. Working with the ideas of Critical Care staff and patients, the designs, by Landscape Architects Lavigne Lonsdale, aim to create a beautiful but practical healing garden in a courtyard between Trelawny Wing and the Emergency Department. This therapeutic space will be immediately below the Critical Care Unit to allow the best possible access for critically ill patients and their families and carers.
There will be space for up to two hospital beds, at any one time, supported by Critical Care Unit therapists, nurses, medical staff and families and carers. There will be restful seating areas, therapy and rehabilitation areas, and the garden will reflect the essence of Cornwall, night and day, through the seasons. The garden will also be available for Critical Care staff to use as a rest area – for quiet times, break times and decompression.
As well as providing a space for quiet reflection, the garden will also be filled with the power and drama of nature: plants that will fill the senses; trees, ferns, flowers and grasses of all textures and heights; the pleasant smells and sounds of the natural world brought to the patient’s bedside. We hope that this healing garden will allow our critically ill patients to feel alive once more, or perhaps for one last time.
We need your help
We still need support and additional funding to deliver a ‘gold standard’ Healing Garden for the people of Cornwall. You can make a donation or get in touch to support the garden in a different way. Contact Royal Cornwall Hospitals Charity rcht.charity@nhs.net or call 01872 252858.
Hopes and Dreams
Staff from the Critical Care Unit at Royal Cornwall Hospital gives their thoughts at the beginning of the Healing Garden project.
“It’s going to be really amazing to deliver care; physio, nursing, whilst outside in the sunshine,” Taz Zee, Service Manager.
Robin’s Story
We are of course indebted to Robin Hanbury-Tenison and his wife Louella, for raising over £100,000 from an incredible fundraising campaign for the Healing Garden. Robin and Louella continue to be closely involved in the project and rally support across the County and beyond to make everyone’s dream garden a reality. You can watch Robin’s incredible story here.
