Make a better space for people living with dementia

Design can have a powerful impact on how we navigate and experience our environments.

If you are living with dementia, the difference between a space that ignores your needs and one that embraces them is profound. The first may be a place where people are confused and frustrated, and the latter, a place where people feel at home and enjoy a better quality of life.

The Dementia Centre at HammondCare has been considering how to make that difference for over 25 years and, through their Design School, this expertise can be yours as well.

In their two-day, interactive course you will gain essential knowledge and tools to assess how supportive a space is for people living with dementia. Equipped with these new skills, you will be empowered to develop new and exciting environments and reimagine older spaces for the better.

The August Dementia Design School has sold out so new dates have been released on Wednesday 6 and Thursday 7 of September 2023, at the brand-new purpose-built dementia village at HammondCare Daw Park in Adelaide.

The Dementia Centre’s design approach is grounded in the cottage model of design, which in its simplest form creates spaces that are domestic by nature and familiar to people as a home.

The design principles and features will help you address the new Government design guidelines and residential aged care accommodation framework requirements that are soon to be released.

“There’s been a great focus brought upon the service environment for residential aged care, the accommodation framework and the design guidelines that are to be released,” said Daniel Jameson, Design Lead at the Dementia Centre and key presenter at the school.

“We know change is coming and this school will support you to respond to the legislative changes but also create better spaces, which in turn will create better lives.”

Among the topics discussed in the school are the current obligations and challenges for providers, theoretical explorations of design and dementia and the relationship between them, and practical concerns such as how to communicate effectively with architects to create better spaces.

You will come away with the tools to evaluate spaces and identify areas for improvement, and be better able to meet the needs of people in your care.

Join the two-day Dementia Design School at Daw Park in Adelaide on September 6-7 and learn how designing and implementing better spaces promotes a better quality of life for people living with dementia. 

For more information visit HammondCare’s The Dementia Centre.