Elephant & Cheetah Lodges

Gillespies were appointed to develop landscape masterplan proposals for the first phase of the West Midland Safari Park Masterplan. This new 10 year masterplan would be delivered across 5 phases and would see the park reinvent itself from a traditional safari park into a more unique and exciting visitor offering, leading the trend for overnight accommodation within the zoo sector. Jonathan McLoughlin was Gillespies’ in-house design lead for the project and worked closely with the WMSP design team and project manager to develop an immersive proposal for the Elephant and Cheetah Safari Lodges.

The first phase development would see the introduction of 8 themed African safari lodges, 6 lodges with views onto the Elephant habitats and 2 lodges viewing into the Cheetah habitat. The challenge was to create a lodge experience that felt immersive and which was set within a high-quality environment that also felt welcoming to day visitors. All whilst ensuring that neither user group negatively impacts or encroaches on the animal areas. For the lodges viewing into the Elephant spaces, we wanted to create an experience for lodge guests that enabled them to view the animals as they drank from the ‘watering hole’, all from the comfort of their own private terraces. Our inspiration for the landscape design was to create an ‘African bush’ with open grassland areas and numerous watering holes.

Our design allowed us blur the barriers of the animal space by the use of hidden containment and moat systems visitors could feel like they were sharing the animal spaces, making for magical and captivating experiences.

Creative use of topography and planting has been implemented to remove cross-viewing of guests and offset the visual impact of new large Elephant housing.

The scheme also includes new state-of-the-art animal housing, visitor walkways, viewing points, and large landscaped habitats. The overall objective of the project was to create an immersive environment and promote animal wellness through design that gives animals opportunities and choice.

(NOTE - Image credit to West Midland Safari Park)