DTUK1110

April 26-May 2, 201024 United Kingdom EditionSpecial Feature A former widescreen repair workshop might seem an unlikely candidate for conversion to a dental practice but that was the choice for Ivory Den- tal Care to expand their Blackpool practice back in December 2008. The growing success of the four dentist partnership meant the team had just run out of space in their existing premises. They also wanted to be able to offer new services to attract additional private patients but their building was bursting at the seams. After a long search over nearly three years and considering lots of alternatives, the partners settled on a former windscreen replace- ment workshop and purchased the building in December 2008. The short-term plan for the new site was to provide two additional surgeries enabling expansion of the business from a four to a six surgery practice. When asked why they finally decided on this building Elena Barlow, the Practice Manager explains “The location is fan- tastic, it is just a mile from our existing practice which makes working across both sites easy for the team. The building also has all important parking fa- cilities which are difficult to find in the more residential areas around the town. It is also a vast space, with plenty of room to ac- commodate the future needs of the practice.” Visualising the potential of the former workshop must certainly have been a challenge but Elena recalls at the time just how con- vinced she was that it was right for them. “It gave us the blank canvas we wanted to be able to design a practice from scratch. With such a huge open space to work with it granted us the free- dom to put our imaginations to work to design a state of the art practice that would complement our existing site and reflect the ethos of the partners.” Rightly, Elena is very proud of the building’s transformation, few would guess its original func- tion. “We replaced the two huge workshop doors at the front of the building with floor to ceiling windows. The massive expanse of glass gives the whole building, but especially the reception area, a feeling of openness and space.” From windscreens to whitening Dental Tribune looks at a new practice which has transformed an old windscreen repair shop in Blackpool into a fabulous dental surgery Ivory Dental - Surgery Ivory Dental Team Ivory Dental - R