Designing for dementia the mental health & dementia facilities magazine September 2024 Charting the future of care TVC TECHNOLOGY SOLUTIONS p12 Integrating smart TV and digital signage KERRY SOUTHERNREASON p14 Award-winning interior designer discusses her work
Project Delegates Join us to expand your professional network and stay updated on the latest developments in the industry. [email protected] Suppliers Meet with the decision makers delivering mental health & dementia estates and facilities. [email protected] 12th – 13th Nov 2024 The Belfry Hotel & Resort, Warwickshire The mental health & dementia facilities forum provides the perfect environment for those delivering mental health & dementia facilities, including the UK’s leading architects, contractors, M&E contractors, NHS foundation trusts, private mental healthcare providers and care homes to meet with leading industry suppliers, in a relaxed, sociable environment to create lasting business relationships. Tel: 020 8288 1080 www.mhdf-forum.co.uk meet. connect. do business. Creating meaningful connections in business Pre-scheduled 1-2-1 meetings Select who you want to meet! Receive a bespoke meeting schedule prior to the forum, plus a printed directory with all attendee details. Gain industry knowledge Get exclusive entry to informative seminars, hosted by industry leading professionals discussing key topics in the industry. Extensive networking After a busy day of meetings, naturally extend your relationships over lunches, coffee breaks and networking drinks.
mhdf magazine 3 Ada Belfield and Belper Library, one of the integrated dementia care homes from Glancy Williams Architects Contents 5 News A round-up of the latest news and events in the sector 8 Designing for dementia An interview with Lisa Deering and Adam McFarland, joint managing directors with Glancy Nicholls Architects, to discuss dementia design and current projects 12 TVC Technology Solutions How Care UK’s new care home integrated advanced Smart TV and digital signage technology with the help of TVC Technology Solutions Editor’s Note September 2024 Designing for dementia Designing for dementia involves more than just creating aesthetically pleasing spaces; it requires a deep understanding of how physical environments affect individuals with cognitive impairments. Effective dementia design prioritises both functionality and emotional wellbeing, ensuring that interiors and buildings not only meet practical needs but also foster comfort, dignity and engagement. When approaching the design of care homes or spaces for individuals with dementia, it’s essential to focus on several key principles. Safety is paramount, which means avoiding confusing layouts and incorporating clear wayfinding systems to help residents navigate their surroundings with ease. Signage should be intuitive and prominent, and spaces should be designed to minimise potential hazards and reduce anxiety. Sensory elements are another critical aspect. Engaging textures, pleasant scents and interactive features can help stimulate positive emotions and reduce stress. For instance, incorporating varied textures in furniture and decorations, and providing sensory objects, can make spaces more engaging and comforting for residents. In this issue, we spotlight two architects and a designer whose innovative and pioneering work is shaping the future of dementia design. On page 8, Lisa Deering and Adam McPartland, joint managing directors at Glancy Nicholls Architects, share insights into their award-winning contemporary dementia care projects that are beginning to transform care environments within inner cities. While on page 14, interior designer Kerry Southern-Reason reveals how her vibrant and aesthetically captivating interiors are deeply rooted in both research and personal experience, setting new standards in design and approach. Ultimately, designing for dementia is about creating environments that respect and support the individuality of each resident. By focusing on safety, sensory engagement and emotional wellbeing, designers and architects can create spaces that are not only functional but also nurturing, helping individuals with dementia lead fulfilling and dignified lives. Helen Adkins Editor [email protected] the mental health & dementia facilities magazine Publishers Stable Publishing Limited SBC House, Restmor Way Wallington, Surrey SM6 7AH, England. t. 020 8288 1080 f. 020 8288 1099 e. [email protected] healthcaredm.co.uk Editor Helen Adkins Sales Director Julian Walter Production Nicola Cann Design Gemma England Managing Director Toby Filby The publishers do not necessarily agree with views expressed by contributors and cannot accept responsibility for claims made by manufacturers and authors, nor do they accept any responsibility for any errors in the subject matter of this publication. 14 Award-winning interior designer Kerry Southern-Reason We meet the award-winning founder of Care Home Interiors to talk about creating dementia interiors with a difference 14 12 8
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mhdf magazine 5 NEWS Hallmark Luxury Care Homes has opened two new care homes and purchased a care home development in Cardiff. The award-winning operator has acquired a 1.78-acre brownfield site at Melrose Hall in the St Mellon’s district, where a residential, dementia and nursing care home with 81 bedrooms will be built. The site has vacant office buildings which will be demolished with construction starting in the summer of 2025. Managing director of Hallmark Luxury Care Homes, Aneurin Brown, said: ‘The acquisition of the Melrose Hall site represents a key milestone in our growth strategy, expanding our geographic presence in Wales to meet the growing demand for specialist care. ‘We are looking forward to utilising our 26 years’ experience to build a home which will be in the heart of the community and alongside our dedicated team, and which will support residents to thrive in all aspects of later life.’ Also in Cardiff, the operator has acquired Penylan House, a former Linc Cymru Housing Association care home. Brown said: ‘Penylan House is an excellent care home that shares Hallmark Luxury Care Homes’ values and commitment to delivering high-quality relationship-centred care. We are looking forward to supporting the existing Penylan team, the residents and their families.’ Specialist business property adviser Christie & Co managed the sale of the brownfield site and the 75-bed residential and nursing home, which was sold for an undisclosed sum. Regional director at Christie & Co, Rob Kinsman, commented: ‘We are delighted to act for Linc Cymru Housing Association in the sale of Penylan House and wish Hallmark Luxury Care Homes all the very best. We’re sure the home will go from strength to strength under their stewardship.’ Hallmark Luxury Care Homes provides award-winning, residential, nursing and dementia care to 1,500 residents across 23 locations in England and Wales. In 2024, the operator was named a Top 20 Care Home Group for the nineth year, from residents and relatives on independent review website, carehome. co.uk. • www.hallmarkcarehomes.co.uk www.christie.com Hallmark expands in Wales Children from St Martin’s Garden Primary School and Hopscotch Nursery have come together to play with residents at the UK’s first care home play garden. The recently opened play garden at Hallmark Midford Manor in Bath was inspired by residents’ memories of their own childhood experiences and designed by children in a school competition. Born out of a partnership between Hallmark Care Homes Foundation and the play charity, London Play, it’s hoped the garden will be the first of many in care homes bringing wide-ranging benefits to young and old alike. UK’s first care home play garden launched The garden features a children’s play area, a storytelling chair, and a seating area that will be used for outdoor lessons. Both the school and nursery are making use of the area by playing games and reading to residents on a weekly basis, thus improving their literacy skills. Wellbeing manager at Midford Manor, Kerry Huggins, said: ‘It has been really lovely to see the bonds formed between our residents and the children. They love to sit in the big chair and tell stories to residents and to each other, which is great for developing their imagination.’ CEO of London Play, Fiona Sutherland, said: ‘London Play is delighted to see that the first play garden in a UK residential care facility is already working its magic, and bringing younger and older generations together around a shared language of play. We look forward to seeing the garden develop and bloom alongside new and stronger intergenerational relationships.’ •
6 mhdf magazine NEWS Willmott Dixon has been chosen by Bath and North East Somerset, Swindon and Wiltshire Integrated Care Board to build a new £20 million mental health unit in Bristol for people across the northern half of the south west region with a learning disability or autism. It aims to support up to 10 patients at any time, with the building specifically intended for those whose needs cannot be met by existing hospital or communitybased services. With completion set for 2025, the unit will help keep people closer to home and reduce the need for patients to be admitted to facilities far A new residential care scheme designed to promote and maximise independent living has completed in London, providing 70 new homes and tackling the wider housing crisis in the area. Reardon Court in Enfield, located on the site of a former care home in Cosgrove Close, has been designed to enhance individuals' quality of life through access to a multi-purpose environment. The scheme includes two communal courtyards, a central social space and several auxiliary function rooms, with hobby rooms, a library and a hairdressing Construction completes on £31m extra care housing scheme area promoting independence and connectivity between residents. Encircling the internal courtyards, accessible corridors have been incorporated into the design to enhance communal living and promote social inclusion. Multi-disciplinary consultancy Pick Everard is behind the scheme, collaborating closely with contractor GRAHAM and Enfield Council to deliver architecture, project management and contract administration, as well as M&E, sustainability and energy, and civil and structural engineering services. John Clarke, director at Pick Everard, said: ‘The different elements of the scheme come together to create a mini community within Enfield where residents can enjoy a varied offering of active social and wellbeing opportunities, aided by an inclusive and disability conscious design. Each flat benefits from an outward facing balcony, with those on the ground floor having access to a garden space to really enhance a sense of independence that is present throughout the scheme.’ The Enfield scheme has been commended by local delegates for its wider impact on aiding housing shortages in the area, with older residents able to move into high quality housing, while increasing the availability of family homes in the borough. As well as maximising housing opportunities, the scheme has also incorporated a green design philosophy, with more than 100 solar photovoltaic panels installed on the roof, alongside sustainable drainage systems (SuDS) to help with rainwater management. • www.pickeverard.co.uk Willmott Dixon to deliver Bristol mental health unit away from family and friends. The new unit will be run by Avon and Wiltshire Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust and complements another similar facility currently under construction in Devon. Ben Stunnel is an autism peer mentor whose lived experience, along with that of others with the condition, helped to influence the design of the new build. He said: ‘It has been very rewarding and confidence-building to have our thoughts and ideas listened to and it will be very exciting to see the building going up and taking shape knowing that we’ve contributed so much.’ Willmott Dixon was procured under the P23 framework, and is working with Ryder Architecture, Edmond Shipway & Partners and Hydrock Consultants as part of its wider team. • www.willmottdixon.co.uk
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8 mhdf magazine DEMENTIA DESIGN Can you outline your journey to becoming specialists in the dementia and care sector? Lisa: When we started working with Birmingham City Council in 2004, we realised that there wasn’t an awful lot of knowledge in the area of dementia design. The University of Sterling was doing a lot of research on the subject, so we ended up working with them to come up with some of the design principles. We worked on a lot of prototypes and spoke to carers about how long, for instance, it takes to assist someone at certain times of the day and how to approach complex care needs. After the recession hit in 2008, building came to a halt within Birmingham, but then we started to work with Derbyshire County Council because their adult and social care service requirements were starting to build up. Adam: The first one we did in Derbyshire was Oaklands Village, which is a facility delivering a mix of specialist Lisa Deering and Adam McPartland, Glancy Nicholls architects and joint managing directors with a specialised focus on dementia care, have brought their expertise to a variety of award-winning work over the past 18 years. Helen Adkins met them to find out more about past and future projects community care bedrooms and extra care apartments, alongside a varied amenity offer that fosters strong links within the Swadlincote community. The scheme encourages visitors to enjoy a range of facilities that are open to the public – including function rooms, a bar and bistro, plus a hairdresser, convenience store and library, all invigorated by a regular timetable of events and activities. Its charity ethos has allowed successful partnerships across South Derbyshire, which continues to develop through local links with suppliers, businesses and customers. Since opening in 2012, the development has been hailed a huge success. As a result of the design and clustering of the facilities available, there have been instances where residents have been able to re-skill themselves. The residents and staff love their living and working environment and the local communities’ use of the facilities have given the building a vibrancy that has exceeded even the original vision. In 2013, Oaklands was awarded the ‘Best Residential Scheme’ at the RICS Awards, ‘Best Social or Affordable Housing Development’ at the LABC and the ‘Gold Award’ by the Dementia Services Development Centre. Our approach is that we're looking at facilities that can serve multiple purposes – places that can have a community element and offering more than palliative end of life type care. This has been a continual thread through a lot of our work. Designing for dignity: The evolution of dementia architecture Ada Belfield Centre and Belper Library is a community-focused scheme providing 40 dementia-friendly residential bedrooms with a lounge, dining areas and activity space, plus a café and library
mhdf magazine 9 DEMENTIA DESIGN Has you design evolved over the years and in what way? Lisa: I think there's a view that these types of places are very twee and should look like something from the 1940s, and yet a lot of dementia sufferers are actually early onset so could be 55 plus, and even 70-year-olds are not old enough to remember what a kitchen was like in the 40s. They would have grown up in the 1960s, where their surrounding may have been very modern. Adam: When you look at the Meadow View Dementia Care Centre, that building isn't mock-Tudor or twee, but a contemporary piece of architecture that stands on its own right. There’s a reason for people being there, but it's generally a nice place to be, with fabulous views. It was designed to be a bit hotel-esque, with a bit of Miami in terms of the terraces – although overlooking Matlock and Darley Dale. The Ada Belfield Centre and the Belper Library – another community-focused scheme providing 40 dementia-friendly residential bedrooms with a lounge, dining areas and activity space, plus a café and library – is a great exemplar of those ideas around care and community. We have a public library with children learning to read there, and then people with dementia are various stages being cared for, and that crossover we think is critical. How does the design of dementia care units differ from other residential projects and what are the key principles? Lisa: A huge part of dementia design is visual, so it’s important to make it easy for the resident to find their way around. We often position doors so the resident can see the toilet if they wake up in the night, which helps to avoid confusion over why they woke up. If a resident leaves their room, they should be able to see activity, whether that's a dining room or living area, or a door leading to the garden – not just looking down bland corridors. Adam McParland and Lisa Deering, joint managing directors at Glancy Nicholls Architects ‘In many of these communities, you’ll find multigenerational homes, but there’s a stage where people have to go into care, yet want to stay close to their families’ We also need to make sure we’re improving light levels, to make sure floors don’t have a change in colour that can be seen as a step or hole, making it a trip hazard. If you use dark colours on walls, dementia residents may also see that as a hole in the wall, because they won't perceive it as a dark colour, so you want to keep your colours on the lighter end, and stick to the ones that leave the spectrum last. Adam: We get heavily involved with signage, which needs to be integrated into the overall design of the building. These can also be quite pictorial because people with dementia struggle with their ability to read and perceive words. We had a great success story at Swadlincote, with an elderly >>
10 mhdf magazine DEMENTIA DESIGN The multiple award-winning Meadow View Specialist Dementia Residential Care Centre has 16 long-term and 16 short-term bedrooms with associated dining and lounge areas, plus a restaurant/café, hairdresser, activity rooms, consultancy rooms and treatment facilities lady who had come from quite a bad care home that hadn’t been set up for dementia. When she arrived, they had to get her out of bed, wash and dress her. After about six months, one of the care workers went in one morning and she’d got up, showered herself and dressed herself. The difference was that the design had been made easy for her. When she put her foot on the pressure pads beside the bed, the bathroom lights came on, so she knew she should go into the bathroom, and the room was set up so the furniture had vision panels in, so she could see where her clothes were. It’s all about having visual clues to help you do things that are ingrained. When it comes to the overall planning of the building itself, we avoid dead ends wherever possible, as this can lead to confusion and distress. We include balconies because any sort of external amenity space has a very positive effect on people's mental health – just being Oaklands Village is a facility delivering a mix of specialist community care bedrooms and extra care apartments, alongside a varied amenity offer that fosters strong links within the Swadlincote community able to watch the world go by is quite critical, as well as allowing people to perceive a time of day and it giving them an added perspective. What’s future of dementia care home design and can you tell me a bit about your next project? Adam: One aspect we are now interested in is inner city care facilities. We’re looking at a scheme right in ‘When you look at the Meadow View Dementia Care Centre, that building isn't mock-Tudor or twee, but a contemporary piece of architecture that stands on its own right’ Handsworth, Birmingham, which is in the very early stages of planning. It’s in a Sikh orientated community and we’re looking to build a provision that fits within a brownfield regeneration site, that has really close connections with a nearby temple. We’re aiming to provide a multi-age spread within the scheme, with apartments for first-time owners, as well as family accommodation and the later living residential units. The University of Stirling’s research have highlighted that, if care facilities can be provided within town centres, there's evidence to suggest that that provides a vibrancy where occupants will feel part of the broader community. A lot of the lessons that we learned working on the Derbyshire schemes are starting to translate into more inner-city care facilities, and that’s interesting because we also do a lot of work with the regeneration of brownfield sites. We're already having regular dialogue with the leaders of the temple, the wider community and their representatives. In many communities, you’ll find multigenerational homes, but there’s a stage where people have to go into care, yet want to stay close to their families. I think this idea sets a new bar for what the wider country should be looking at doing, for any religion, community or walk of life. Lisa: This whole idea of moving into town is something a lot of the private developers are starting to look at, where previously they’d be wanting developments on ten acres outside of town to build 250 units and then a town within it. Now developers seem to be looking at smaller town and city centre sites. For us, this project is the first of its type that has such a cultural element to it, and that really excites us because it's going to generate a better place for residents, with the community on their doorstep. It’s a trend we need more of. • www.glancynicholls.com
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12 mhdf magazine TECHNOLOGY TVC Technology Solutions Care UK’s new Oat Hill Mews care home in Leicestershire has integrated advanced smart TV and digital signage technology from Bolton-based TVC Technology Solutions for its recent launch for integrated care Oat Hill Mews, a new Care UK development, provides assisted living, on-site care and wellness services. The facility features luxury accommodations, including an on-site hair and beauty salon, a café, a cinema, multiple lounges and a bar. To complete this high-tech venue, Care UK asked long-term audio, visual and domestic appliance supplier partner, TVC Technology Solutions, to furnish the bedrooms, resident common areas and cafes with the latest in smart TV technology. Maintaining the cutting-edge theme, Care UK wanted the latest in digital signage throughout the main areas, enabling them to show various guest information, restaurant menus and entertainment schedules. The new technology includes 43-inch Mitchell & Brown Smart TVs in the bedrooms, which offer Freeview Play, streaming services and Full HD picture quality, supported by a seven-year warranty and backed up by Michell & Brown’s UK-based customer help desk. whole host of audio and visual solutions, alongside small domestic appliances and white goods in both new build properties and their existing homes. Oat Hill Mews is a stand-out luxury care home venue that boasts cutting-edge smart TV technology for residents, alongside the very latest in flexible digital signage in the reception area. We are very proud to be a trusted supplier and partner to Care UK, with Oat Hill Mews giving us the opportunity to deliver a class-leading AV solution for the care home sector.’ • www.careuk.com tvc.uk.com In the reception area, alongside a large smart TV screen, TVC provided an industry-leading commercial digital signage media player with MySign content management software. The system can be managed by staff at Oat Hill Mews to show a host of information including where residents are situated for their incoming guests, display upcoming trips and events, on-site staff and activities, or simply to display local weather and current events from around the world. MySign’s cloud-based software has the functionality for members of staff at the development and remotely from Care UK’s main offices to easily schedule, modify or update the content with minimal fuss. As a default, time-based templates provide information on meal times, current and five-day weather forecasts. TVC’s Andy Greaves, sales director, praised the longstanding relationship with Care UK over 15 years: ‘The association trusts us to supply, install and maintain a
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14 mhdf magazine INTERIOR DESIGN Kerry Southern-Reason Kerry Southern-Reason began her career as a chartered accountant, but her journey took a turn toward design after being influenced by her family’s fabric business. ‘I was always around fabrics,’ she says, noting how this early exposure gave her a natural sense of colour. Around 30 years ago, she transitioned into curtain manufacturing and designing Kerry Southern-Reason began her career as a chartered accountant but has since become a leading figure in dementia-friendly interior design. With a deep passion for enhancing care environments, she has earned multiple awards for her innovative approach to dementia design. She spoke to Helen Adkins about her journey interiors for high-end show homes, Swiss chalets and footballers’ houses, amongst others. Her focus shifted when her grandmother, who had dementia, was placed in a care home. ‘It was the most horrible place I’d ever been in,’ she remembers. ‘They had just one room left and it was green, and I told the nurse that my nan didn’t like green, and she just said, “Oh, she’s got dementia – it doesn’t matter”. And I thought, it does matter, it matters to me and it will matter to my nan.’ The experience of this, as well as her mother’s time in a hospice, ignited Southern-Reason’s commitment to elevating care home standards, and in 2001, she set up her company Care Home Interiors. ‘When we design a care home, we can literally change someone’s mood and happiness,’ she says. ‘As I got older and lived through seeing my mum pass away with cancer, I actually wanted more to life, so that’s when I decided to specialise.’ Southern-Reason’s understanding of dementia and its effects on design deepened partly through the courses and research undertaken by Stirling University and HammondCare in Australia. There, she used their frameworks to guide her designs, but also gained knowledge from her own personal experience of having two children who are neurodiverse – one with sensory processing disorder. ‘In the early years, I learned very quickly how interiors affected my son. So, if he was in a red and blue room, and it was really noisy with hard floors, I’d notice his mood change,’ she says. ‘When he got older, he could articulate that, saying he hated rooms that were
mhdf magazine 15 INTERIOR DESIGN ‘noisy’. But when it came to my nan, it was difficult, because you don’t get to ask a dementia resident how their surroundings affect them because they can’t articulate easily. Then I noticed that things that affected my son would also affect my nan, so if you took her into a communal room, which was really noisy with big primary colours – a real sensory overload – she’d become irritated. Having that experience with my son really helped me to understand.’ In addition to the lessons learnt from Stirling and HammondCare, SouthernReason’s approach also involves significant and ongoing observation of residents, and feedback from staff and families. Once the team have designed a home, she goes back to observe the residents and how they interact with the space. DESIGN CONSIDERATIONS Southern-Reason’s care homes prioritise accessibility and safety, in addition to creating a calming and aesthetically pleasing environment. She explains: ‘One of the greatest issues for a dementia resident in a home is feeling anxious, which comes out in many different ways, so they can be reserved or aggressive. With everything we design, the first thing we do is think about that first barrier and reducing anxiety. Then we’ll think about making it look good.’ Colour choices are made with emotional impact in mind, particularly those that are known to affect emotions adversely. Bright yellow or red are best avoided, for instance. ‘We’d never do a proper yellow room,’ she says. ‘We might do a gold room but not a yellow one.’ Another important consideration is wayfinding, so signage is clear in all her homes. ‘I call them bus stop signs, because they stick out from the wall. So, if you look down the corridor, you can see straight away where the rooms are, which ‘When we design a care home, we can literally change someone’s mood and happiness’ mitigates anxiety. We also put objects in places so residents can find their rooms,’ she says. Flooring is important to dampen noise, but also for safety. A beige carpet with a black mat, for instance, could look like a hole to someone who’s visually impaired, which may result in that resident stopping or stepping over the mat, resulting in a fall. Similarly, chequered floors affect residents’ safety, so are avoided. To cater to sensory needs, varied textures are used with furniture and furnishings. Two to three different types of fabrics will be used on the company’s bespoke chairs, so the sides will be rough, but the tops will be soft. SouthernReason has also found that patterns can be acceptable if managed properly: ‘For many years it was said that you can’t have patterns in dementia residence rooms, but we haven’t found that to be the >>
16 mhdf magazine INTERIOR DESIGN case. What we often do is that, if we have a patterned curtain, we’ll make it double sided with a plain back so if a resident is distressed about the pattern, it can be turned around. But to be honest, that’s never happened.’ Other sensory elements include the 3D pictures on the walls, designed with flowers and other elements. ‘I thought the residents would move the flowers around and organise them, but they don’t – they just stroke them.’ The company’s custom-made furniture includes practical features, like softened corners, as well as curtains and upholstery that’s specifically manufactured for care homes. When it comes to balancing practicality with interior style, SouthernReason cites the huge strides forward in the industry regarding fabric, which is both aesthetically pleasing and fit for purpose: ‘There’s a company called Agua Fabrics and another called Panaz, who are very good at these types of fabrics, which are antimicrobial and very practical.’ One of the company’s most engaging ‘It’s lovely winning all the awards but, actually, what I really want to know is that I’m changing someone’s life’ feature is the installation of gold thrones at Richard House: ‘We had a really tight budget, but it’s quite a fun group there – they have a TikTok channel – so we wanted to do something that had a big impact without spending huge amounts of money. We took a chance, and it could have been a disaster, but we put them in and, literally, the residents were fighting over them. They all want to sit on them when it’s their birthday, and the children come in and want to sit on them because they are thrones, and the staff members sit on them when it’s their birthday, so it’s become a real fun feature.’ AWARDS AND REWARDS Since founding the company, SouthernReason has received the Pinders Healthcare Design Award in 2016, 2020, 2022 and 2023 for both dementia design and best interior design. This year, Care Home Interiors was nominated for Business Mum of the Year at the Women’s Business Club Awards, intended to inspire women who balance their careers and family responsibilities, and to bring attention to the challenges women in leadership positions face. Southern-Reason has also been a finalist in the 2024 Care Home Awards, and her company was shortlisted for a prestigious BIID Interior Design Award. Southern-Reason reflects on her journey: ‘We’ve worked hard to drag the industry to where it is now, and there are other people who’ve done it as well – there’s a handful of us over the last 15 years that have worked really hard to improve the standards within care homes, to the point that many are now phenomenal.’ The real reward, however, is the impact her designs have had on residents’ lives. ‘There was one resident,’ she remembers, ‘who had come into the home and was very unhappy. His daughter told me that he’d stopped talking, but then he came out of his bedroom and came up to me and said, “I never thought I’d live anywhere like this”. ‘Another resident would cry all day, saying she needed to get out because she needed to find her mum. I remember being at this home and she stood right behind me, so I braced myself because I was changing her surroundings – which can be quite distressing – and actually she just grabbed my hand and said “This is so pretty”. ‘It’s lovely winning all the awards but, actually, what I really want to know is that I’m changing someone’s life.’ • carehome-interiors.co.uk aguafabrics.com panaz.com
18 mhdf magazine PREVIEW mental health & This unique networking event has been designed to bring together architects, contractors, M&E contractors and NHS foundation trusts, in addition to private mental healthcare providers and care homes, with innovative industry suppliers in a relaxed and social environment. This year’s theme is: Rethinking mental health spaces • Promoting recovery through art and nature • Integrating mental and physical health • Private funding for mental health care development • Medium-secure spaces that promote wellbeing for all • Service user led design for autism/ CAMHS • Bringing care closer to home We are pleased to announce that Stable Events will be hosting our annual mental health & dementia facilities forum, in partnership with Design in Mental Health Network (DIMHN). Speakers include: 1. Crystal Jones Analyst from WELL, who will be discussing advancing health and wellbeing through the built environment 2. Richard Mazuch Director of design research and innovation at Arcadis, IBI Group, focussing on neurobiophilia and mental health 3. Alice Green Architect at Arcadis, IBI Group, talking about investing in places of safety 4. Lianne Knotts Director at Medical Architecture, who will be speaking about medium secure spaces that promote a meaningful day, particularly at Sycamore at Northgate Park Hospital The event is a must-attend event for those involved in the design, build and management of all types of mental health and dementia facilities. This is a real opportunity to do business. Attend mhdf as a supplier: Over one-and-half days, you’ll benefit from a tailored schedule of one-to-one meetings with your chosen mhdf project delegates and the architects, contractors, project managers and consultants delivering projects in the UK. What’s included: • 1-2-1 scheduled meetings and planner • No time wasted • Abundance of networking opportunities • All-inclusive package (accommodation & meals) 2024 dementia facilities forum
mhdf magazine 19 PREVIEW • Exclusive event directory • Limited competition • Access to informative speaker sessions CONTACT: [email protected] Attend mhdf as a complimentary project delegate Join us as our guest at the mental health & dementia facilities forum, and learn about the latest trends and developments taking place across the rapidly evolving mental health environment. The event comprises thought-provoking seminars, the opportunity to meet manufacturers and suppliers to find out about the latest innovations, products and services, and, above all, network and do business with your peers. During the event, we host informative speaker sessions, where industry professionals will highlight the many innovative designs and developments within the construction industry particularly in the physical activity industry. Additionally, we will provide 1-2 nights' accommodation, all meals and refreshments, a drinks receptions and 12-13 November 2024 The Belfry Hotel & Resort Sutton Coldfield a gala dinner giving you extensive networking opportunities! Registration for the event is now open: https://tinyurl.com/449nyvt6 For more information, visit our website www.mhdf-forum.co.uk or call 0208 288 1080. Georgie Smith will be pleased to answer any of your questions.
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