The brief from Advantage Care was to create a home environment that looks and feels like a high-end hotel, yet operates to the needs of the resident, the visitor, and the staff.
It should be a place where both everyone can enjoy a range of experiences in different locations within the same facility; such as public and private dining, beauty, wellness, and function amenities, but also places of refuge where families and staff can escape to for moments of peace and tranquillity.
Our interior design and environmental graphics teams brought with them a wealth of project knowledge and experience from the Residential, Hotel and Hospitality sectors to create this balance of luxury design, personal attention, and functionality.
From the first concept design, we identified and named to the individual residential wings by combining a seasonal and home reference; such as Spring Cottage, Summer House, Autumn Manor, and Winter Lodge. These themes fed through all stages of the interior and environmental graphic designs and into every built detail; such as custom fabric and furniture, light fittings, graphics, artwork, and signage.
Throughout the three-story aged care home, a feeling of calm and comfort is everywhere. This comes through with the selection of materials, custom design such as wall graphics and rugs. Warming colours and natural Australian materials used in the timber joinery, sandstone fireplaces and custom rugs and furniture, all help to avoid that hospital or clinical feeling.
Lighting was a fundamental design tool to avoid the feeling of a hospital. Warm light levels highlight and soften points of interest, such as the show kitchens, bookshelves, joinery walls, artwork, and graphics. Feature custom pendants were designed as artwork at the entry and cafe/bar lounge.
Two types of dining rooms are used throughout the home; the more public show kitchen dining (designed to feel like a restaurant) and the dementia dining (which is designed like a kitchen in your own home).
Many of the aged care operational services are concealed or hidden from the view of the residences and visitors. However, essential services; such as nurses’ stations,are in prime locations for constant surveillance by the staff; yet were designed in the same design language as the other public area joinery to make them less obvious.
The residents’ bedrooms mix all of these disciplines (home, hotel, and aged care). They are designed to be a long stay apartment with ensuites, wardrobes, and a kitchenette, yet also use hotel design references in the bedheads and chaise lounge in place of a desk to give visitors more comfort. This is combined with providing the most basic aged care requirements of a room; such as bed circulation allowances, bathroom design, fittings, and fixtures.
