Arranged around a series of courtyards, the nursing home becomes not only a protected environment for its residents but also an active place for the citizens of the local community that encourages interaction between generations. The common houses are located around the main courtyard, creating the semblance of a small town square.
By splitting the volume into smaller units and maintaining a height of two stories, we create a complex with a human scale. Together with differentiating the buildings by color and shape, this significantly helps wayfinding for people with cognitive disabilities.
All the housing units have an outdoor access connected to the common spaces, and the layout is developed with a focus on dementia, where all the residents’ rooms face the common rooms rather than a corridor. All circulation spaces are designed as loops of various sizes to enable physical movement without getting lost or running into a dead-end.
The two clusters share common spaces and service functions and are connected on two levels to create the logistic functionality of a single building. The building volume offers perfect conditions for the use of prefabricated CLT-elements.
