Brasilia, Brazil, 29 March - 3 April 1999
The public realm of private lives: the role of
circulation and amenities in the design of group residential homes for
older people
Dr Julienne Hanson
The Bartlett School of Graduate Studies
(Torrington Place Site)
University College London
Gower Street
London WC1E 6BT
England
tel (44) (0)171 391 1740
fax (44) (0)171 813 4363
email j.hanson@ucl.ac.uk
www http://www.spacesyntax.com
This paper addresses the design and organisation of residential care homes
for older people, in order to identify those aspects of group living that
are supportive of a more 'therapeutic' setting and, conversely, those
which are more conducive to a feeling of 'institutionalisation' and loss
of control. The vehicle for the research is a comparative configurational
analysis of 30 recent, innovative care homes for older people and 30 modern,
purpose-built residential settings for other social groups including students
and singles, hotel guests, the physically or learning disabled, people
with mental health problems and those members of society who are being
cared for in medical or custodial settings.
The defining morphological difference between mainstream housing and group
housing of all kinds is that, in the latter, the residential units are
invariably grouped together to form a larger building complex, in which
the individual units of accommodation are connected together internally
by a shared system of circulation that provides common access among the
dwellings and to its shared amenities. This interior 'public realm' mediates
the relations of residents with one another, between residents and their
care-givers, among the staff and to visitors to the home and to the wider
community. Its detailed design may protect the privacy and autonomy of
the residents when they are 'at home' or it may effectively imprison them
in their room, or worse, expose them to unwelcome intrusion and surveillance
from the people passing by their door.
The research will therefore focus on the design of the shared, 'public
realm' of the 60 group homes and the way in which this relates both to
the private sphere afforded to residents and to the interface between
the group home and the outside world. It will draw on and develop Hillier
and Hanson's concept of the 'reversed building' to describe the degree
of institutionalisation of the public-private interface and a social interpretation
will be made of directly-observed patterns of use, movement and co-presence
in each group residential setting. Findings will be reported for the relation
between configuration, the care regime which operates in each group home
and the perceived quality of life of all the categories of building user,
and an assessment will be made of the extent to which more general conclusions
can be drawn for the design of group residential settings of all types.
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