The Children’s Inn at NIH Hires Gensler To Create the Future “Place Like Home”

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
BETHESDA, Md. (May 16, 2019) – The Children’s Inn at NIH has partnered with Gensler, a leading global architecture, planning and strategic consulting firm, to create a facility master plan that sets the direction for the future look and feel of the hospitality facility. The Inn’s goals are to enhance its overall guest experience through a meaningful redesign of its interior spaces to better support children’s and families’ health and wellness.

“The Children’s Inn plays a crucial role in helping the NIH carry out vital pediatric research that requires seriously ill children and young adults to participate in often lengthy clinical research studies,” says Jennie Lucca, CEO of The Children’s Inn. “With our 30-year anniversary around the corner, this is the right time to overhaul our design to best meet the unique needs of NIH pediatric and young adult patients for the future.”

The Inn opened its doors in 1990 with 36 rooms to provide free and comfortable lodging and a wide range of support services for families of children with rare or serious diseases. In 2004, The Inn underwent an expansion, adding a wing that provided an additional 23 rooms. While some areas of The Inn have undergone renovations over the years, the overall flow and design of its interior spaces has not been updated since inception. On a yearly basis, The Inn serves more than 1,700 children and young adults.

To create “The Inn of the future,” Gensler will create a facility master plan using evidence-based design principles, best practices and future trends. The process is expected to take about 11 weeks.

The Children’s Inn is a private nonprofit that provides free lodging and a wide range of support services to provide “a place like home” to families of children with rare or serious diseases whose best hope is a clinical research study at the NIH. In its 29 years of operation, The Inn has supported more than 15,000 children and young adults up to age 30 from all 50 states and across the world, making it possible for them to participate in groundbreaking studies at the NIH Clinical Center, the world’s largest hospital focused entirely on clinical research.

Inn residents have helped advance treatments for HIV/AIDS, leukemia and other cancers, asthma, mental health issues, sickle cell disease, bone and growth disorders, and a wide range of genetic disorders, including life-threatening immune deficiencies and other rare diseases. The Inn’s mission is to make childhood possible today and a cure possible tomorrow. For more information, visit www.childrensinn.org.

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Media Contacts

Sonja Luecke
Communications Manager, The Children’s Inn at NIH
901-340-1975
[email protected]

Mysba Regis
Marketing and Communications director, The Children’s Inn at NIH
240-274-2101
[email protected]