TWELVE months after planning was granted, work has started on the £6m Maggie’s Centre at The Christie.
I believe in the power of architecture to lift the spirits and help in the process of therapy
To mark the occasion the first of the 20ft high timber trusses that will form the building was given a ceremonial unveiling on Wednesday 22 April.
Designed by local lad Lord Norman Foster and his practice it will be the Maggie's charity’s seventeenth centre and its largest to date with 60,000 people a year exepcted to visit from across Greater Manchester.
Its construction has been made possible by the generosity of people like businessman Norman Stoller CBE and Cathy Parfett, principal donors to the scheme who will also bury a time capsule on the site containing personal momentos.
Mr Stoller, 80, is a regular benefactor to the region with his Stoller Trust contributing £7.5m to the concert hall at Chetham's School of Music, £2.5m towards a new organ for Manchester Cathedral and £1m to the Oldham Enterprise Fund.
The new centre is being built in the grounds of The Christie and like all others its aim is to provide emotional support and practical help for people with cancer and their loved ones.
When plans were passed Lord Foster said: “We are delighted that our plans have been approved for the new Maggie’s Centre in Manchester. This project has a particular personal significance as I was born in the city and have first-hand experience of the distress of a cancer diagnosis.
“I believe in the power of architecture to lift the spirits and help in the process of therapy. Within the centre there will be a variety of spaces; visitors can gather around a big kitchen table, find a peaceful place to think or they can work with their hands in the greenhouse.
“Throughout, there is a focus on natural light and contact with the gardens. The timber frame, with its planted lattice helps to dissolve the architecture into the surrounding greenery.”
Dan Pearson studio is working on the landscaping.
Maggie’s charity was the dream of Maggie Keswick Jencks who lived with advanced cancer for two years before she died in 1995. The charity now has seventeen centres in Britain, online and abroad. Each is different and has been designed by leading architects based on the needs of people living with cancer and with the aim of creating a calm environment for them.
