Inpatient accommodation
Doorset and room design complement each other
Julian Hall, Sales director at the Kingsway Group, explains how the company developed its new range of Signature doorsets for three distinct service-user pathways. Noticing that design teams often faced the challenge of trying to select components to provide a co-ordinated overall room design, he also discusses how the specialist in anti-ligature products for mental healthcare environments commissioned leading mental health designer, Gilling Dod Interiors, to create entire room spaces based on the Signature design concepts.
The reason that some mental health spaces get branded as ‘institutional’ and ‘prison-like’ is often that, by necessity, they feature stringent security measures. However, these need no longer be a barrier to good design – as I hope to explain in this article in discussing the development of Kingsway Group’s new Signature doorset range, and Gilling Dod Interiors’ work with us to create entire room spaces based on the Signature design concepts to give clarity to three care pathways. The care environment is proven to assist with
aiding recovery. Of course while good design alone won’t replace timely professional interventions and treatment programmes, just as sitting in a nice clean A&E department wouldn’t fix one’s broken leg, Kingsway Group passionately believes it is possible to produce supportive, therapeutic environments that hasten recovery, and that a new approach is needed. This belief helped drive the development of, and identify the need for, the new Signature range, which we designed using the following steps:
DEFINING PURPOSE – CARE-PATHWAY SPECIFIC We received feedback that the Signature ranges needed to deliver clear benefits for specific care pathways to enable project teams to select a range that would suit the patient type . This complete approach, we felt, would provide building designers with a clearer sense of purpose when commencing a project, and would allow the design to reflect the needs of the user group in the best possible way. The three care pathways that the Signature range seeks to provide solutions for are: Children and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS), LD (learning disability) and secure/rehab, Adult Acute care, and Older Adult long-term care. Within these pathways there are varying patient needs which need to be recognised, but research and feedback show that there are
unique and distinct needs, which the Signature range seeks to address in a design-led approach.
DEFINING INSPIRATION – ICONIC LOCATIONS
The next step was to choose a design inspiration for the Signature hardware ranges, and here the Kingsway Group design team was able to draw on its global reach to establish three clear design styles based on iconic locations that give the background to the unique designs: ‘Malmo’, ‘Mayfair’, and ‘Manhattan’.
Malmö
This iconic Swedish city encapsulates the Scandinavian design ethos of simplicity, minimalism, and functionality, to provide the calm that is so desired in mental healthcare settings. This doorset was designed for CAMHS, LD, and secure/rehab applications.
Mayfair
This location – with the doorset developed for Adult Acute care settings – was chosen as being synonymous with chic design and trendy upmarket style, a hub for boutique hotels and ‘a life better lived’.
MALMÖ Manhattan
The last location was selected for its rich heritage of art deco influence to provide a classic elegance that has so many benefits for a healing environment. This doorset will principally be targeted at use in Older Adult long-term care environments
DEFINING DESIGN – ‘HOTEL-STYLE MADE SAFE FOR MENTAL HEALTH’ In the hundreds of meetings we had with design teams since the start of Kingsway Group in 2010 we constantly heard the request for our anti- ligature hardware and doorsets to create a ‘hotel feel’. While this gave us some direction, it needed some honing to enable actual design. Our first action was to look to the hotel industry and see how it defines a ‘boutique hotel’ design: Two such definitions we found were:
‘With a sense of intimacy and privacy…décor, aesthetics, and attention to detail’.1 ‘The definition of a boutique hotel could be, it is an accommodation that makes its guests feel happy and contented while staying there’.2 With this research completed, we now had a clear goal to work to – our next step was the hardware designs, where we drew inspiration from leading architectural ironmongery manufacturers. As a result, no past anti-ligature product design was introduced, giving the project a complete fresh start.
DETAILED DESIGN FOR EACH RANGE Malmö hardware design and door style This vision panel on the Malmö doorset was designed to be recessed into the face of the door to provide a flush finish to prevent any intentional or accidental self-harm. The fascia is manufactured in an oval shape to be visually pleasing and blend into the door as much as possible. The door handle to the corridor side
THE NETWORK
OCTOBER 2018 29
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