The 2021 Health Care Health Design forum comes as the world grapples with the most far-reaching health crisis in more than 100 years, as well as an ageing population and persistent health disparities.
The forum will explore the role of architects in responding to these pressing concerns and improving health care, in Australia and around the world.
Across four sessions, held live via Design Speaks’ virtual portal this June, leading architects, researchers and healthcare providers will seek to answer this fundamental question while presenting exemplar healthcare projects, from hospitals to community aged care facilities.
The first session, Access All Areas: Designing for Ageing, will focus on work and research that is addressing the needs of an ageing population. In light of the troubling findings of the Royal Commission into aged care and the systemic weaknesses in the sector exposed by COVID-19, “there’s never been more urgency to improve the living standards for the final chapters of life,” the organizers note.
The Hogeweyk village in the Netherlands.
Image: Paul Tolenaar.2
Speakers for this session include Yim Eng Ng from Conrad Gargett in Brisbane, who is conducting research into the design of residential aged care facilities for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people while designing cross-cultural projects such as the Nareeba Moopi Moopi Pa aged care facility on North Stradbroke Island; Joshua Wheeler, director of MGS Architects, who will discuss his firm’s approach to designing site-responsive, socially informed aged care facilities; and Eloy van Hal of the Amsterdam-based company Be Advice, one of the founders of De Hogeweyk, the world’s first village designed specifically for people living with dementia.
Session two will be all about designing for community, with speakers delving into “the importance of design, consultation and collaboration for creating fit-for-purpose, community-centric healthcare facilities.”
From London, Maggie’s Centres head of property Siobhan Wyatt will discuss the charity’s pioneering cancer drop-in centres, designed by the likes of Norman Foster, Daniel Libeskind, Amanda Levete and Alison Brooks. Closer to home, David Kaunitz of Kaunitz Yeung Architecture will present his firm’s award-winning Indigenous community healthcare facilities in remote Pilbara and Debbie Lynn Ryan of McBride Charles Ryan will present community-focused projects including a new integrated healthcare centre in Yarram, in regional Victoria, that “stitches together” local hospital, aged care and allied health services.
The third session will look at the intersection of architecture and mental health, and ask “will the movement of a human-centred design approach re-shape what we currently understand to be healthcare design?”
Speakers include Peter Johnstone of Stockholm’s White Arkitekter, the biggest architecture firm in Scandinavia and a world leader in health care design; Rebecca McLaughlan, a researcher at the University of Newcastle who has for more than a decade investigated the capacity of architectural design to support wellbeing within healthcare environments; and Jan Golembiewski, an architect and researcher whose work is driving innovation and research around behavioural, affective and psychological reactions to the physical environment.
The final session will tackle the timely topic of designing for crisis. One of two international speakers in this session, Mass Design Group principal Amie Shao, is based in Kigali, Rwanda, where she oversees research focusing on health infrastructure planning, design, and evaluation. She will present on the ways Mass is leveraging its global infection control and research experience to address the COVID-19 pandemic in the developing world. The other international speaker, Scott Davidson, principal of health at US firm Perkins and Will, has also been investigating the impacts of COVID on health care design, and will present on healthcare design “in a post-COVID world.”
From Australia, Hassell’s Michaela Sheahan will discuss the importance of good design in emergency situations.
The four sessions of Health Care Health Design will be viewable live in June, and also available to watch on demand in the following months. To purchase tickets, click here.
Health Care Health Design is a Design Speaks event, organized by Architecture Media (publisher of ArchitectureAU.com) and supported by principal partner Dulux.
