04/08/2026
Some buildings carry a story long before you ever touch them. This one began its life in 2006 as a blood bank designed by DellaMonica and Snyder Architects—a distinctive structure defined by its double barrel-vaulted roof and iconic presence in the heart of Sonora, California. That exterior identity remains exactly as they created it; Archis Architects did not modify the exterior in any way.
The challenge was something different. How do you transform a space designed for one type of care into a place for an entirely different kind of healing? For the Tuolumne Me-Wuk Indian Health Center, Physical Therapy project, the answer came from listening to the building itself. The original design offered generous, volumetric spaces—meant to hold people, movement, and purpose. By allowing those volumes to reconnect with the human scale, we were able to preserve the spirit of the architecture while reshaping its function.
Inside, we introduced a layout that supports the rhythm of physical therapy with continuous sight lines for staff, intuitive flow for equipment and patients, and secure, efficient zones that meet the demands of modern medical practice.
The result is a space that feels open, light-filled, and restorative—a building that now supports healing in a new way without sacrificing the intent of its original design. A once open blood bank, now a place where movement, recovery, and wellness take center stage.
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