Mental health is among the most pressing health issues in the world, and yet barriers to care—chronic underfunding, stigmatization and scarcity of practitioners and facilities—result in nearly half of those in need to forgo treatment.

The new UCSF Nancy Friend Pritzker Psychiatry Building transforms this historically underserved area by providing unprecedented access to mental health services in a beautiful, friendly and welcoming environment. The facility is UCSF’s first integration of pediatric and neurological services within a mental health outpatient facility. The result quadruples market access to mental health services in the Bay area while accelerating scientific discovery of improved treatments and prevention.

Supported by a gift of nearly $60 million from philanthropists John Pritzker and Lisa Stone Pritzker, longtime supporters of UCSF, the new building is named in honor of John’s sister, Nancy Friend Pritzker, who died by suicide. The building is developed by SKS Partners and Prado Group. ZGF is Design Architect in collaboration with Perkins&Will.

Exterior glass connects inhabitants to the cityscape beyond and substantial glazing encourages visual transparency on the interior, supporting a welcoming patient experience for a population that has been historically relegated to dimly lit and highly controlled behavioral healthcare spaces. This amount of openness to the community and transparency in how the building will operate was a primary design driver and is emphasized on the interior through the soaring, five-story atrium. The atrium provides full visibility into the heart of the building and into how the building operates. Upon arrival, the space lifts the eyes upward and welcomes patients inside with a message: you matter.

There was a strong aspiration on the part of UCSF to buck the institutional palettes and harsh fixtures of traditional behavioral health spaces that can stigmatize receiving care. To that end, the design team created a welcoming patient experience with a bright and uplifting aesthetic. Integrated graphics and colors, textures and natural materials evoke the Bay Area region. Inspiration for the materials comes from San Francisco’s colorful “Painted Ladies” houses and the foggy ocean surroundings. Each floor features an identifiable color scheme to help with orientation and wayfinding. Public waiting rooms on all the floors face the atrium interior and give patients and families a sense of connection and belonging. Daylight filters into the atrium from the skylight and into consult rooms carefully located adjacent to windows, connecting occupants to their natural circadian rhythm. An extensive art program includes over 100 nature-inspired photographs by groundbreaking artist Richard Misrach, which can be discovered in public waiting areas, staff workspace, and research and clinical zones throughout every floor. A lush rooftop garden is accessible for staff to host meetings with each other and with patients while enjoying access to fresh air and biophilia.

The building is the culmination of a long-standing vision to integrate physical and mental health at UCSF by eliminating arbitrary boundaries that have isolated psychiatry and the behavioral sciences from other medical disciplines that treat brain disorders. This facility brings multiple programs and researchers at UCSF’s Department of Psychiatry together for the first time in UCSF history to enable flexibility, interaction, and collaboration.

Working with a multidisciplinary team led by renowned child psychiatrist and human geneticist Dr. Matthew State, ZGF identified program priorities and potential synergies through the integration of clinical, training, and research functions in one building. The result is UCSF's first co-location of research and mental healthcare for pediatric and adult patients. By treating patients across the full age spectrum, the facility has a unique opportunity to evolve or transition care as a patient ages. It helps clinicians and researchers better understand physiological and environmental explanations for behavior across a patient’s lifespan.

Members of the department of pediatrics, neurology, radiology, neurosurgery, psychiatry, anesthesiology, and obstetrics/gynecology now work together. To support the various disciplines are spaces that include medical consultation rooms, patient and visitor waiting rooms, and dry labs. The facility interior is designed to encourage collaboration, providing the setting and resources for advancements in research and patient care. Careful attention was given to strategies that draw researchers and practitioners outside of traditional workplaces and promote interdisciplinary engagement, including open workspaces, collaboration spaces, and staff lounges.

A 180-seat auditorium and associated convening center sits at the base of the atrium to host meetings and exchange ideas among members of the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, the broader UCSF neuroscience community, the Bay Area community, and numerous national and international partners, learners and collaborators.

The striking new home for University of California, San Francisco’s Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences will radically transform the clinical setting; enhance patient care, training, and research; and offer a unique and powerful array of mental and physical health services for patients at a time when the nation is confronting unprecedented challenges and ongoing stigma associated with mental health treatment.