Q&A with Miller Hanson Partners Q: What is the major challenge in designing for seniors? Wilt Berger: At this stage in their lives, residents are making an important transition, physically and emotionally. Our goal is to create senior communities to which a resident’s reaction is better than, “I guess this will be OK.” We work at planning communities, down to the smallest design details, that can generate a sense of enthusiasm about the new home. Is this easy in senior design? No. These aren’t college freshmen moving into a dorm, with their whole lives ahead of them. But it’s productive for the design team to have this worthwhile goal in their heads. Q: As young architects develop their talents at Miller Hanson, what do you try to instill in them, besides design and project management skills? John Rova: The attitude of approaching every project with as much care and concern as if a member of your own family were going to live there. For senior design, this means thinking about a parent, a grandparent, a favorite uncle. Q: On the new Heritage Commons community for the Minneapolis Housing Authority, seniors who live in public housing served on the design-review committee? Was that helpful? Kent Simon: Very much so. The seniors had their own wish list, and we tried our best to accommodate it. They kept us on our toes. Literally. I’d point at a floor plan, showing how conveniently the laundry rooms are located on each floor. They’d ask, “But how many steps?” So we’d walk the number of steps in the presentation room to demonstrate. It was terrific when they’d get excited about features like raised-bed gardens or a package shelf at the door of every apartment. Q: You’ve said that rather than following trends, Miller Hanson works at understanding social/cultural shifts. What does that mean exactly? Wilt: Here’s an example: There was an article in The New York Times about seniors who moved south for the golf 20 years ago now returning north when a spouse dies, or when they become frail and their children want them closer. We read this and think, How widespread is that? If it’s a major shift, what are the implications for our clients planning assisted-living communities? Q: Is there a definable Miller Hanson “look” to a senior building? Kent: Only in the sense that it should look as if it fits with the surrounding neighborhood. Q: What can clients expect from Miller Hanson with regard to universal design principles? Kent: The longer we work with universal design, the more social and market value we see in it. Features like lever handles on doors are great for anybody, which of course is the essence of universal design, that it should be usable by all people to the greatest extent possible. Q: How do you build a sense of community in a senior project, so that it’s more than individual apartments with some designated commons areas? John: We consciously incorporate many principles of New Urbanism. Creating small neighborhoods within a building. Planning points of social contact, where residents are likely to interact as they go about daily activities, like picking up their mail. Q: With an aging population, what’s ahead for senior design? Wilt: “As the senior population changes, we must meet the needs of people who cannot see themselves living in traditional senior housing. One direction may be mixed-age communities, a model that has been used successfully in Europe. Instead of segregating people by age and then having to reconnect them to the community, they are not isolated in the first place.” |