Cinema design


The big benefits of the big screen: designing care home cinemas


With care costs rising, do residents really need luxury features such as cinemas? Jo Goddard, director of Just Imagine Contract Interiors, reminds us how the silver screen can bring joy to the care home environment, and explains how she and her team go about designing a bespoke cinema room


One of our favourite parts of designing a care home is the ability to design an exciting new cinema room for residents. As you will see, not only is this a vibrant and fun space to be, but its benefits are endless when it comes to bringing people together. This is where our design and creativity really flows – in order to achieve a fun space for residents to relax and enjoy the movie. Why are cinema rooms so important in care homes, and specifically dementia care homes? Well, who doesn’t love a feel-good movie? Being able to switch off from the outside world with a great film, in a comfortable chair or, preferably, on a recliner, with a cosy blanket and a bag of popcorn, can turn a bad day into a good one. For residents living with dementia, something as simple as watching a comedy movie or a nostalgic film from the past can help ease stress and anxiety and create a sense of immersion and escapism that we can all relate to.


Fancy a trip to the cinema? We start with the design and choice of funky furniture. Here we can add a unique touch with a bespoke television surround to complement the theme. We like to be daring with our colour choices, using vibrancy to add to the fun. The installation of interesting lighting design is integral to the authentic feel of a cinema room. The design should be bold or nostalgic or a mixture of the two. We try to create the full cinema experience from the moment the residents step into the room. When designing a care home, we obey our ethos of creating home-from- home interiors, but the opposite applies to designing a cinema. Residents should enjoy the experience of stepping out and taking a visit to the pictures. We endeavour to create a true experience in terms of design, look, and feel – including the smell of popcorn!


June 2022 www.thecarehomeenvironment.com


Movies provide a great conversation


starter. Everybody enjoys the anticipation before the film begins, followed by the enjoyment of watching the movie itself, and then the inevitable post-film discussion. Even if watching a movie solo, it is still the perfect opportunity to spark up a conversation about the film with others. But at the end of the day – what is better than going to see a movie? Why, going to see a movie with a friend or loved one, of course! Being able to share the experience of watching movies is a definite relationship booster. When visitors arrive, residents can enjoy taking the family ‘out’ to the cinema, enjoy a birthday celebration, or simply


Movies can act like time capsules from a lost era, and the feeling of nostalgia is a powerful tool


savour a private film viewing as an everyday treat. Having this space to enjoy makes for a very special time. Movies can act like time capsules from


a lost era, and the feeling of nostalgia is a powerful tool. Residents can watch old movies from their childhood to unlock memories that have been buried over the decades. Nostalgia is a way of remembering, of talking about and sharing the important events and memories of one’s life. Watching nostalgic movies can help provide comfort and meaning to a person’s experiences. Being reminded of the nostalgic elements of a film can conjure up memories and emotions, as can the cinema experience itself. This is why décor is so important to every cinema room that we create. As part of designing for care homes, it is important for us to accommodate those who are living with dementia. We consider landmarks; research shows that people living with dementia use landmarks as


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