Our Approach
The Importance of the Interior in Retirement and Aged Care Facilities
The aged care industry is evolving like most other aspects of modern society. Now residential aged care facilities are considered to be “home” for the residents with full-time skilled and high quality care available to meet their increasingly complex health and lifestyle needs.
The higher expectations of our ageing population and government mandated standards and compliance requirements demand that the interiors of facilities reflect these new and developing realities.
To meet the expectations of residents and their families and to comply with building standards, the attention to interior fit-out is now recognised as a significant aspect of both new and refurbished building programs.
For both new buildings and refurbishment of existing facilities, considerations in the specifications and selections of the interior fit-out are integral to the overall concept.
Furniture design and placement, artwork and signage and selection of hard finishes, colour, floor covering and soft furnishings all need to combine to create an atmosphere that can be the difference between the “outstanding” and something “very ordinary”.
Creating the “New Home”
Today, the interior of an aged care facility is unavoidably the “make-or-break” aspect of a successful project. It is the “home-feel” combined with “wow” factors that generally influence a positive response within the potential resident and their families. This is an emotional decision made as much with the heart as with the head.
Operators place great emphasis on avoiding an institutional look or feel and it is what goes into the newly-created empty shell that puts the face on the building and impacts on the attitude of residents and staff as to how they relate to a building and living environment.
It is well recognised that many residents in aged care inhabit a very small world and so every individual aspect of that narrow environment becomes extremely significant.
ACI understands this very well and its interior design always goes beyond the construction elements to ensure consistency of themes and design ideals throughout the building.
The common areas such as lounge, dining, community centres and corridors must also typically follow the design theme.
The Importance of Artwork, Colour and Light
These elements are essential to the overall ambience of any interior.
ACI knows that this is especially important in those areas where residents have declining mental capacity and begin to lose the ability to think rationally. In these cases, interior design and fit-out becomes absolutely paramount for these residents to find their way around a facility and enable them to find their way back to their own room and/or area.
Major artworks, wall colours, or a particular piece of furniture can readily become a marker, a signpost and a guide to allow these residents for find their way “home”.
The sensitive and considered use of art, colour, furniture, soft furnishings, texture and sound all combine to set boundaries for particular groups of residents who can’t make their way around as they once may have done.
These markers and the road map they create combine with the consistent use of basic design elements to create an essential sense of security and comfort for many residents.
Artwork can be personalised to an individual resident as a stimulus or as a trigger to failing memories that hold such significance that they become a beacon in the day-to-day challenges of moving around from their room to the TV, to the garden or to their meals and community areas.
When do you need Aged Care Interiors to help you?
It is essential that an integrated approach to building design and the interior fittings and fixtures is in place in the early stages of creating a new facility. It is also just as important to consider these aspects when undertaking refurbishment of existing facilities – be it on a large or small scale.
The principals of Aged Care Interiors have lengthy experience working with regulators, architects and builders to achieve our many past successes.
By becoming involved in the earliest stages of design, ACI develops a better understanding of the needs of both aged care providers and residents.
We work from beginning to end with individual residents and their families to tailor artistic design aspects to specific rooms and areas. This ensures that the ambience of a supportive built environment is reflected in the interior design.
Our collective experience in the art and design of the internal fit-out of residential aged care facilities ensures we have many repeat clients who rely on our skills to create internal environments that meet the financial and service requirements of operators and the homely sensitive, creative and confidence-maintenance so important to residents and their families.
