Cleveland Clinic Lou Ruvo Center for Brain Health
The Lou Ruvo Center for Brain Health in downtown Las Vegas is composed of two buildings—a revenue-generating event space and the clinic's research-and-treatment building—connected by a draped steel façade.
Although architect Frank Gehry's sources are never strictly literal or singular, sand dunes of the desert suggested the twisting volumes of the four-story event hall.
The cubic massing of a hillside village in Morocco inspired the clinic building.
The draped steel fa§ade that dominates the complex is composed of an undulated steel frame clad in 560 unique panels.
As it meets the ground, the skin peels away to reveal larger windows and entry doors.
The skin is supported by a series of columns and supports attached to the building, which can be seen most clearly in the courtyard between the event space and clinic.
Lobby.
Curving hallways in the clinic building.
The event space, which holds 450, is designed to bring people together. "Its purpose is to generate money," Gehry says. "This has got to be a banquet room like none other in Vegas. It had to be different to compete." It has been an overnight success, according to Gehry, and allowed Ruvo to raise as much as $20 million in one night for the clinic.
Event space ceiling.
