The three story, 185 beds, short term care facility is situated on a five acre hillside site within the San Francisco General Hospital campus.  The Mental Health Skilled Nursing Center provides a rehabilitation focus that promotes improved independence and enables residents to achieve their highest level of functioning and improve the quality of their life.

Designed to provide home-like structured settings for patients, the 130,000 square foot building wraps around two courts, a central landscaped courtyard and a horticultural therapy courtyard.  The outdoor courtyards provide outdoor areas for structured patient activities, informal group or individual recreation.  A separate outdoor recreation and gathering area has been developed for teenage patients.  Small courts provide open space access at all building levels.  Site work included landscaping of hillside, street and campus edges as well as development of surface parking for staff and visitors.

ABLA developed the overall site master plan and provided site planning, site development and landscape design implementation.  This included grading, parking and road layout, landscape construction, and softscape design.  The design process involved extensive collaboration with neighborhood groups, City Planning Department, City Planning Commission, Bureau of Architecture, Civic Design Review, and review by the Office of the State Architect Health Planning and Development (OSHPD).  The scope of work included schematic design through construction observation.