E-Book, Englisch, 160 Seiten
Metzger Building for Dementia
1. Auflage 2018
ISBN: 978-3-86859-932-9
Verlag: De Gruyter
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: Adobe DRM (»Systemvoraussetzungen)
E-Book, Englisch, 160 Seiten
ISBN: 978-3-86859-932-9
Verlag: De Gruyter
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: Adobe DRM (»Systemvoraussetzungen)
Im Zuge des demografischen Wandels ist die Architektur heute und in der Zukunft mehr denn je gefordert, die Gestaltung von Wohnsituationen für alternde Menschen und vor allem solche mit Demenz neu zu denken. Mit zunehmendem Alter sind wir mehr denn je auf eine räumliche Umgebung angewiesen, die uns nicht nur positiv beeinflusst, sondern vor allem in unseren Alltagsaktivitäten unterstützt und altersbedingte Beeinträchtigungen ausgleicht. Im Zentrum neuer Anforderungen steht eine multisensorische Architektur: Farb und Lichtgestaltung, Klangdesign, sinnlich erfahrbare Materialien und Oberflächen sowie haptisch attraktive Formen ermöglichen erst eine Raumatmosphäre, in der Bewohner sich wohlfühlen. Diese bietet Sicherheit und Orientierung und fördert motorische und kognitive Fähigkeiten. Bauen für Demenz wurde als ein Leitfaden für eine zeitgemäße und würdevolle Architektur entwickelt, die Menschen mit Demenz gerecht wird und sie als inklusiven Teil der Gesellschaft versteht.
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Rethinking Architecture This book is the result of a search for a new way of thinking about architecture. It is about buildings and the spaces for movement that they create, and not exclusively for an aging society. Research on this topic has drastically altered my thinking about life in old age and the physical activity and movement that becomes increasingly necessary at this stage of life. In architectural terms, thinking means an ability to adapt to an environment with sheltering spaces, in order to feel physically at home.1 Significant parts of the metaphor coming into play here originate from a phenomenology of the body and are transferred to architecture. Movement is introduced as a key motif as an extension of existing ideas. However, security and living are at first considered as a single unit. In the course of the book, it will be pointed out that age-adapted forms of living require only marginally higher financial expenditure at the start, and that such expenditure is justified. Good architecture not only helps maintain health in old age, but pays for itself in all areas, always assuming that movement through the interior and exterior spaces of the building is assisted and motivation is maintained over long periods. When looking for a house in the sheltered housing project in Vals, in the Swiss canton of Graubünden/Grisons (the town that is famous among architects for the Thermal Baths by Peter Zumthor), I asked for the old people’s home and was met only with shakes of the head. The local inhabitants remain in their houses with their vegetable gardens to the end of their lives. A home for the elderly built in the 1990s remains almost empty. There is no need for it. The image of the elderly in Vals remains with me. It points to fundamentals of healthy living, which can also be realized, in part and with modifications, in urban areas. Phenomena My argument concerns a radical change, a fundamentally new understanding of housing for the elderly, which is currently still designed to hinder movement within the home and its surroundings instead of encouraging it. It names dramatic failures in the past, which still have an effect today and largely determine housing for old age. However, it also points to alternatives. Architecture is regarded as a space with potential for movement that can offer stimulation for communication and mobility. Thus, architecture would reflect the biological plan of humans, whose organism only retains its stable balance at all stages of life through regular alternation of motion and rest, which is all that makes a healthy life possible at every stage and especially in old age. Changes in the direction of appropriate housing for the elderly at the early planning stage of new buildings require the participation of all groups. It is not only about integrating people’s movement within the building as a natural component but also making it the core of the planning.2 Stimulating paths for residents and short routes for carers create requirements that should be taken into account early on in the planning stage. Architecture with good spatial planning and sensorially effective materials will be essential in the field of care for the elderly as the key to dignified living in old age. This will be of equal benefit to residents, carers, and relatives.3 In this book, details of furnishings and equipment are also dealt with under the heading of ergonomics and sensory quality alongside functional elements such as door handles, window catches, switches, bathroom fittings, and handrails. Another area covers heating and ventilation and the opportunities available for individual ventilation and air conditioning. Other matters of interest are the provision of suitable light sources for the elderly, media equipment, and the installation of soundproofing. Heat zones and absorbent surfaces are considered, as are attractive features that encourage movement—ideally in connection with the changing seasons. Just as important as these details are the nature of the topography, the prevalent interior climate, and the situation of the buildings. Centers are preferable; out-of-town complexes must be embedded in structures of local life; peripheral locations should be avoided, and connections to public transport are a must.4 The concept of particularly exciting spaces that is taken from installation art, and the stimulating effects of cannabis use, both of which have already become an accepted part of care for the elderly in the Netherlands5, can be taken up, further developed, and extended by the inclusion of historical approaches, such as the covered walkways and sensory attractions of spa towns. Moving elsewhere, or translocation, is a procedure that is not only known from late twentieth-century art; on the contrary, simulated villages of a kind that could never really exist have already been built. I remember that in the 1950s my grandparents went for walks along the edge of the forest in a particular sea air, not only on the North Sea coast but also in a graduation tower in Bad Orb. Here, air containing salt and minerals trickles down through long corridors lined with brushwood, evaporates and cools. A similar fresh and bracing atmosphere resembling a sea breeze is produced on the land, which is laid out like a plateau with ancient deciduous trees in the spa gardens. The graduation tower in the Spessart National Park in the Main-Kinzig district promoted the health and wellbeing of my grandparents. The building, erected in 1806, is still functioning today and, alongside the panorama of the Frankfurt am Main skyline, is considered one of the most significant and historic in Hessen. Building for Dementia was born out of the conviction that it would make a contribution to the necessary change6 in the understanding and implementation of housing for the elderly. The argumentation is nourished by experiences that have been systematically organized to create spaces. Generally speaking, stimulating spaces promote wellbeing and physical and mental activity that is measurable in terms of distances covered daily and frequency of interaction.7 A person’s mental state can often be understood empirically just from the frequency of contacts. A stroll through the individual chapters of the book links up personal experiences in the context of types of movement that are shown in pictures. The brief episodes range from childhood to the present day. In many passages, the reader is presented with a story that originates from a biographical perspective and describes ways of living and experiences with rooms. Living, thinking, and speaking are assumed to be a single entity and transitions between disciplines are attempted; challenges and concepts of dementia treatment are taken up in order to transfer them to architectural contexts that appeal to memories.8 At the same time, thinking is understood as the process of registering detail in the memory, and the nerve tracts in areas of the brain used for this are demonstrably vital pathways for cognition.9 The ideas about thought and about paths through life spent in buildings and surroundings that have left their mark on us have been taken up from the literature and further developed.10 That is why the book is divided up according to a system that begins with the depiction of a journey through life and its spaces. A pattern of this kind can certainly be transferred to many biographies, in order to extract individual experiences of architecture. Even though we may question the course of the narrative, the authenticity of the images is substantiated and secured. Just as every physical body has a center of gravity, my search concerns the equivalent central point of a building. The image of the hearth as the altar of the house illustrates how rooms can be linked by the laws of physics and as the center of spiritual experience.11 Depictions of childhood reflect such experiences of key places within the house. Memory lives in rooms and especially in sensory experiences.12 Conversely, according to Michel Foucault, spatial requirements that have been disregarded should be named, existing bad spaces should be critiqued, and a connection established with the compulsory measures of corporal punishment. In this context, particular attention should be paid to the issue of how far the strictly functional forms and the high density of twentieth-century housing have a negative impact on people as a result of the failure, or perhaps even the deliberate refusal, to appeal to the senses. The compaction of spaces runs counter to the human desire for individual space. Personal needs are systematically denied when people are forced to bow to the dictates of a machine for living.13 The consequences of radical functionalism in housing14 are discussed in relation to housing for the elderly and alternative options are pointed out with reference to historical types of building groups.15 The bright, airy inner courtyards,16 sheltered gardens, and covered walkways17 of monasteries are being rediscovered when planning for spaces designed to encourage movement and communication among residents. Thinking in architecture is understood as a preliminary stage and as a form of three-dimensional reflection,18 at the end of which a decision will be made that will result in its realization in the form of a building. That is why a range of options in the field of equipment and furnishing for dementia are considered and associated aspects of construction, psychology, and social policy...
