The studio “Designing for Care – towards an inclusive living environment” which focuses on the future perspective for elders in need of care. Aging society, political changes within the healthcare system and the perception towards aging have led to my graduation topic: Bridging the gap – connected by meeting. The cur-rent way of building for elderly is focusing more on individuality and practicality which is leading towards segregation between elders and the society and therefore do not meet the needs and wishes of elders who want to live in a more included and selfreliant environment. Therefore, elders feel neglected by authorities, family and distanced from society. This is partly resulting in social isolation for some elders while they still have the will to participate in society. The feeling of isolation must be counteracted. For this reason, it is my goal to develop a new housing concept where elders feel more engaged with the social network in the neighborhood. The design must ensure that elders feel encouraged to go outside, or at least have a view on activities around the building to meet others from within their private zone. Because during the interviews I often heard that elders (mainly 80+) who are less mobile and more home bound have a great value the space around their house. The design of a new housing concept does not solve all the problems, the urban network around the building must be considered in the design as well. By creating an environment where people meet each other, look after each other and elders are seen as equals and can participate in this social network. A community where elders can live happily in old age.

The Social Courtyards

The distance between many seniors and others in the elderly´s living environment, including myself, is too large. This distance should be reduced because it could lead to social isolation and/or loneliness among the vulnerable elderly. Thereby, as a result of the baby boom generation, a large part of the Dutch population will be older than 65 years old in the upcoming years. That is why the question of a pleasant and personal living environment for this generation is even more urgent. According to my empirical and literature studies this segregation between the elderly and their surroundings is caused by several things:

•Firstly, the growth of this segregation is through the (physical and mental) barriers which make it increasingly difficult to meet others in their direct surrounding (due to age-related disabilities and illness)
•Secondly, most of the housing types for the elderly is now arranged so that they mainly live together with their age group and they continue living in their bubble.
•Thirdly, their “own” social network is getting smaller and the elderly becoming more dependent on help in the immediate vicinity.
These causes can be seen as a chain reaction that keeps getting bigger and therefore the distance gets bigger as well. The issue of this report is to what extent architectural design can contribute to reducing the growing gap between the elderly and their living environment and thus make a positive contribution to breaking through social isolation. Therefore, my research question for this thesis is:

''To what extent does the architectural design play a role in reducing the distance between the elderly and their neighbourhood to encourage the social inclusiveness of them in their living environment?''

The design of the Social Courtyards is the translation of the results of the research question. My graduation project aimed to ensure that the elderly continue to interact passively and actively with their environment in a pleasant way. This is to increase a sense of belonging in the neighbourhood, despite the mental and physical limitations associated with their old age. Reducing the distance of the elderly towards their living environment improves the elderly’s mental and physical health. The design is located in Driebergen and the design is named Social Courtyards.

This research is about the meaning of self-reliant living and what the physical environment can bring to improve this, with as main research question;
In what ways can architecture encourage elderly to become more self-reliant. The research is conducted through fieldwork observations and interviews in care home 't Kampje in Loenen aan de Vecht, as well as through literature and case studies. The anthropological research led to a conclusion that many people living in care facilities show passive behavior and are not as self-reliant as they used to be. Many of them don’t interact as much with each other and barely do something for each other. The goal of this research is to find out what it means to be self-reliant and how a person can remain like that with the help of architectural tools.

Self-reliance is about realising an acceptable level of functioning in the important areas of daily life. If necessary, by organising the right help at the moment that a decline in the performance level threatens or occurs that cannot be prevented or remedied by oneself. These important areas of life are called; ‘life domains’.
Both healthcare institutes GGD and Vilans use these domains to value their clients degree of self-reliance- and direction. The domains differ in some areas, as the domains of the GGD are used for anyone in the Netherlands, and the domains from Vilans are more tailored for elderly. The 10 domains that Vilans describe are; daytime activities, living conditions, physical functioning, mental functioning, cognitive functioning, housekeeping, general daily, social network, mobility, and the financial situation.

Each domain has certain conditions for a person to be called fully self-reliant. Most of these conditions indicate a need for independence and a safe- and healthy living environment. Architecture alone can not provide all the answers for self-reliant living, the living environment around the building plays an equal role in the degree of self-reliance for
a person. The extracted design tools for each domain show correlations between each other. Such as having places for gardening, the promotion of natural movement, the need for a diverse aged target group, homes that are compact and life-cycle proof, close proximity of shops, public transport- and other amenities, and the need for a social environment. These are the main architectural / urban strategies that can encourage elderly to become more self-reliant. These have to do mainly with being- and remaining healthy in a physical way, a mental way, and a social way.

The inclusive living environment in Delft Tanthof brings together Elderly with other generations, offers places to interact with each other on different scales, provides flexible structures to create a future-proof neighbourhood and offers a large amount of variety and options to accomodate different residents.