The UAMS Orthopedic and Sports Performance Center takes shape on a 30-acre meadow just off Interstate 49 in Springdale, Arkansas. Rather than rising as a vertical object, the building settles into the site—low, horizontal, and formed by the existing topography. The team frames the project as “radical hospitality”: a medical facility that supports healing and recovery with the clarity, comfort, and care of a well-run hotel.

Visitors enter at the lower level and rise toward a central courtyard that anchors the plan. Clinic, rehab, and surgery all look into this tranquil center, giving patients and providers an immediate visual cue for orientation and calm. Patient and staff circulation remain visually connected while maintaining clean separations that support efficiency and hygienic control. Ongoing dialogue with surgeons, nurses, therapists, and patients keeps adjacencies, work patterns, and caregiver respite grounded in lived experience.

Arrival and check-in become moments of ease rather than transaction. Daylight, greenery, curated artwork, and domestic-scale furnishings shape warm waiting areas, while soft radiused corners and rich materials establish a consistent interior language. Every recovery room faces the courtyard, and daylight reaches waiting areas, nurse stations, and even operating suites—supporting humane care and sharper performance. The sports performance gym extends that logic outdoors, opening directly to the performance field so training and recovery move seamlessly from inside to out.