Playbook for healing environments

The Playbook for healing environments is a spatial decision-making guide book, containing the spatial strategy to transform De Grote Beek into a sustainable healing environment. The strategy was developed on commission of GGzE, one of the largest mental health organisations in The Netherlands. The strategy consists of four chapters visualising and describing the actions that can be taken over a few weeks, months, years and decades. This is done to highlight the role of time and timing in the positive development of healing environments.
​
To find out why and how this works read the essential summary in English or Dutch. 

Spatial strategy for Landgoed De Grote Beek

Developing a healing environment is not only about how the place looks, but also about how it changes and develops. Healing is a process, and so a healing environment is about making space and time for inclusion, learning and adaptation. This approach is illustrated with specific proposals, structured in four time frames - what can be done in a few weeks, months, years and decades. 

The research was commissioned by GGzE and was developed in a two-year design research project at TU Eindhoven. It builds on the existing masterplan of De Grote Beek, by defining an overarching story and approach for the healing environment and connecting it to existing and new initiatives and interventions. ​​

The complete strategy is published in the Playbook for healing environments (2021).

We commissioned this research because we needed a fresh perspective and professional inspiration about the real opportunities of how De Grote Beek can transform a sustainable healing environment, that is based on a careful look at our location, community and history. What we received was beyond our expectations, it shows all the possibilities, and a new way of thinking, and I believe this book will help and inspire us in the coming years.
Joep Verbugt, CEO of GGzE, 2006-2022

What’s really great about the Playbook is that we can see how the actual spaces might look like with each possible activity, intervention and development. The strength of the strategy is that makes it very concrete, easy to imagine, and accessible for everyone to be part of the transformation, from the clients and their families to the care staff, managers and directors. 
Rob Lammers, Caregiver, Care manager & Centre manager at De Grote Beek & GGzE 1982 - present​

Healing is a process.

Healing is a process, not a final or permanent state. The same is true for sustainability: it is a journey towards a healthier relationship with our landscapes and communities. Accepting the process and embracing the uncertainty are some of the values that GGzE’s clients learn. It only seemed fitting to propose that the healing environment acts in the same way, that it develops at their pace. Instead of focusing on the larger transformations, the project starts with small, localised interventions that are not architectural in the classical sense, but already have the possibility to improve the daily experience of De Grote Beek. The proposals elaborated in each Frame are not all entirely new to De Grote Beek, the novelty is in how the separate parts relate to each other. The physical fragmentation of the site is also a fragmentation of the communities within it. The future development should include ways to heal that. 

Where spatial development meets care
This strategy is essentially a developmental process that has a programmatic, narrative, and architectural layers. The challenge with developing a healing environment is to find the right balance between these layers. Firstly, the construction process is usually such that a building must be finished to maintain structural integrity. Secondly, a building is an investment, so it must be finished as soon as possible to fulfil its purpose and to generate the desired effects. Such technical and administrative constraints are important, but they create the illusion that the process is over as soon as construction is finished. This focus on the result diverts attention from the disruptive effects of construction on life quality in the area during, like the noise and dust. Building is often preceded by demolition, digging and profound disturbance of the area. None of these experiences are conducive of a healing environment. This is why the strategy proposes introducing changes in small, incremental steps, and not in violent, radical leaps. 
​
On the shortcomings of masterplans
Masterplans create the impression that the most important thing is the final state of the project. As a result, they are less fitted for continuous adaptation, meaningful participation or learning through the process of development. To remedy these pitfalls, a master plan needs to be accompanied by an implementation strategy that places people and landscape at the centre and that embraces uncertainty and experimentation. One way of doing this is to work with different time frames; the time it takes to grow a forest, or change behaviour, is often longer than the time it takes to build a house. Time is the key ingredient in inclusive development. Implementing a strategy that acknowledges the time spans at which a person or a landscape can transform is a proven way to include them in the development of a healing environment. 

Read, see or hear about the project

#9 Communities of care and healing environments, from Van het podcastje naar de muur, a podcast series about design in and for health, by Marleen van Bergeijk

Work & Show: Healing environments, a section with outstanding work by members of BNO. This time, the spatial guide Playbook for healing environments by Studio Kornelia Dimitrova.

#4 On avoiding assumptions, from the Warming up to the Pluriverse podcast series by Sophie Krier and Eric Wong

Reporting from the intersection of mental health and sustainable development, an essay by Kornelia Dimitrova, for the research series of Archined. In this series of articles, PhD scholars from various universities explain their research and their way of working.

Experience-based cartography: Rethinking relations between people, objects and environments, a conference paper, presented at the AMPS Experiential Design Conference, in Florida, in 2020.

Om meer te weten over het project in het Nederlands, zie: Architectuur Centrum Eindhoven; Mestmag;

In search of the Pluriverse exhibition, curated by Sophie Krier & Erik Wong, in 2022, at Nieuwe Instituut.