British designer Morag Myerscough had to meet strict clinical regulations to bring her bright colours and harlequin prints to the wards of this children's hospital in northern England.
Myerscough was invited by Artfelt, the Children's Hospital Charity's arts programme, to design the interiors for wards of the Sheffield Children's Hospital.

She designed 46 en-suite bedrooms and six multi-occupancy suites for a new wing of the hospital, added by Avanti Architects. The objective was to make the rooms feel more comfortable and domestic.

Although children's rooms might seem perfectly suited to Myerscough's colourful, graphic style, the design process was not straightforward.
Myerscough gave some of the rooms a paler colour scheme to suit children with autism or others who have an intolerance to bright patterns. She also wanted the rooms to feel appropriate to older children.
"Although the rooms are for children, I didn't want them to be childish because children of all different age groups will be staying in them," said Myerscough.
"I also wanted to create somewhere parents would be happy to spend time too. It was just about making a bedroom that you felt good to be in."

In addition, the hospital environment required that everything be sterile and easy to clean, so Myerscough had to work entirely with plastic laminate.
The wood-like panels in the wards is Formica, which has the woodgrain screen-printed onto paper and then laminated. Painting directly ont...