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A Post-Occupancy Survey of Park de la Cruz Neighborhood Park & Therapeutic Recreation Services

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Architectural Design to Transform a YMCA Building into a Recreation Destination for all Ages and Abilities. 

Several years ago, we were honored to transform a 25,000-square-foot YMCA building into a City of San Diego facility accommodating therapeutic recreation services (TRS) for the City Heights neighborhood and its surrounding communities.

In so doing, San Diego became one of the first cities nationwide with a dedicated and customized city TRS destination offering services and activities for community members with disabilities and special needs.

Recently, Sandra Gramley, AIA, returned to Park de la Cruz Neighborhood Park and TRS to reconnect with Kristi Fenick, CTRS, the District Manager of San Diego Parks and Recreation Department, Therapeutic Recreation and Agewell Services. Sandra wanted to know how the facility had evolved, how it was performing and what lessons could be learned for future projects.

Post-Occupancy Survey

We’re happy to report the facility is looking great. Sandra loved seeing that staff added gallery hangers to some of the walls to display work from students who attend the facility’s classes.

Acoustics are always tough in exercise facilities (and when adapting existing buildings), but the perforated gypsum board we specified for the hallways is doing a great job at absorbing sound.

Since many of the existing building’s interior rooms were dark, our team selected tubular skylights to bring natural daylight into lower spaces. Sandra’s visit also allowed her to verify the lighting strategy implemented works well now that the building is fully operational. The facility first opened at the start of the pandemic, which limited occupancy.

A key element of the TRS, Sandra got to tour the sensory room, which is outfitted with light fixtures, interactive toys, a swing and more. We designed the sensory room to give an immersive sensory experience for people with various abilities and to support emotional and cognitive development.

Grant-Funded Community Facility

Park de la Cruz Neighborhood Park and TRS was a project that grew gradually, and our services grew along with it. The initial project budget was just enough for paint and flooring, but the City kept pursuing and securing grant funding. Accordingly, our scope of work increased incrementally. Despite the ladder-stepping structure, the design and construction program appear seamless when you tour the building.

What does Sandy wish we could still do? It’s the same wish Kristi has – to create a party room. The demand is there, as well as rental opportunities, but it wasn’t possible to provide it in the existing building framework or budget.

Our team and theirs recognizes that we could turn an old, unused pool that’s currently being used for storage into a dance hall and party room. However, the City would need to come up with millions more in funding to support the construction costs, which is no small task.

Program Garden

Soon after Sandra’s tour, the City hosted an event to debut and celebrate a garden at Park de la Cruz. Sandra wouldn’t have missed it.

This garden doesn’t just sit there and look pretty, it has work to do! It’s a program garden.

The garden supports classes, clubs and kitchens. In addition to supplying the on-site commercial and teaching kitchens, the garden is used by the Green Thumb Club, Yummy Meals on a Budget class, Let’s Get Cooking class and more.

Community Engagement

The well-attended garden debut featured lots of fun activities like sing-alongs, pickle ball, bingo, corn hole and line dancing. A color-by-numbers art mural was very popular, with kids and adults painting designated portions within the butterfly outline created by a local artist.

Park de la Cruz Neighborhood Park and TRS is an asset to the community – from kids to seniors. In a San Diego neighborhood that’s been historically underserved with public resources, seniors-in-need can now visit Park de la Cruz for free lunch five days a week. It’s also a place where people of all ages and abilities have access to a wide array of programs and activities.

We’re proud to support the City in its mission to provide these services in a safe place.

Learn more about the TRS activities and resources available for winter 2023-2024 here.

Dogs Celebrate Reopening of Upgraded San Diego Park in Carmel Valley

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Platt/Whitelaw Architects’ Park Design Experience Expands to Include Torrey Highlands Park.

Dogs throughout the Del Mar and Carmel Valley area are rejoicing at the reopening of Torrey Highlands Park…and maybe their owners, too.

This popular dog (and people) park has been closed intermittently for the last year or so for a minor makeover. Platt/Whitelaw Architects was lucky enough to work with the City of San Diego to bring the 1989 park up to today’s standards.

Now our canine friends and their humans can find some reprieve under a newly installed shade shelter with attached benches (from Poligon). A new, half-acre parking lot offers additional capacity so even more dogs (and their humans) can enjoy the park. And a new walkway makes it easy for dogs to dash as quickly as possible from the car to the park (sorry, humans).

California gnatcatcher

It wasn’t just dogs (and their humans) we had to think about, though. This area is home to the California gnatcatcher, an endangered species of bird. We had to engage an ecologist to investigate the park and make sure no California gnatcatchers had built their nests nearby.

Whether it was a dog deterrent factor or just finicky birds, the gnatcatchers didn’t think the park measured up for home construction that year, so we were clear to make modifications.

Much of the design plan involved upgrades to comply with current Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) guidelines. This included knocking out and rebuilding one wall of the restroom structure to provide adequate turning radius for mobility devices.

Nature’s Challenges

Along the way, nature’s challenges continued to pop up, as 2023 proved a remarkably wet year. While the contractor, Ramona Paving, was already working with our civil engineering partner, Kimley Horn, to try to avoid paving over an elusive underground gas line, they had to do so between rain delays.

The very beginning of the project was delayed, too. This time, due to a virus. Just before we were ready to submit architectural plans to the city for approval, COVID-19 shut down everything, including the plan approval process.

While the city would roll out an efficient online review system partway through the pandemic, it wasn’t up yet, so we worked with our wonderful project manager Yovanna Lewis to submit through email.

We appreciated working with a team well versed in park design and construction that took challenges in stride. This included our own Yolanda Velazco.

We’re pleased to announce that Torrey Highlands Park opened in mid-September and is, once again, crowded with dogs (and their humans).

Casa Casillas: a Dream Come True

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Former YMCA Office Transforms into Maker Space.

Former Chula Vista, Calif. Mayor Mary Casillas Salas spent years advocating for an artists’ maker space that would be available to the public. We are proud to be part of Kimley-Horn’s (Prime Consultant’s) team that’s now making her vision a reality.

Origin Story

Named in honor of Paula Casillas, the former mayor’s mother and an artist herself, Casa Casillas will first come to life through the art of architecture. It will then evolve with artistic contributions from community members. We showed off our design for Casa Casillas during its groundbreaking ceremony.

Casa Casillas will include two galleries, three studios, office space, restrooms, a kitchen, storage space and a patio. Formerly a YMCA satellite office, the existing building started as two structures linked together. The structure was subsequently expanded with a building addition.

Design Inspiration

“Even though it is a patchwork building, we really like the proportions,” said Platt/Whitelaw’s Yolanda Velazco.

The patchwork building came with a surprise, too. “Between what will be the two galleries is a double wall, and a couple of windows are hidden within those walls,” Yolanda said. She added that her team plans to restore those windows in the new space to provide connection and light.

Visibility between spaces is a guiding principle of the Casa Casillas design. The work studios will be separated from the galleries with a storefront-style window wall. This will allow artists to envision their pieces on the gallery walls as they work and gallery patrons to consider work in progress as part of their gallery experience.

An outdoor patio will be separated from the galleries with sliding glass doors. The patio provides another separate-but-linked space and serve as an additional area for gathering, working and inspiration.

Yolanda is an artist as well as an architect. She designed the color and materials palette for Casa Casillas based upon her own artist’s experience.

“I like to paint in my free time so I thought, ‘how would I like to have my creative space?’ This is where the white canvas inspiration came from,” she said.

While the kitchen and restrooms have multi-colored designs, the working and gallery spaces, as well as the outside of the building, are left simple and plain in design. Yolanda knows that pops of color will be generously supplied by the artists through their art pieces to provide interesting and thought-provoking architecture.

Instead, she turned to textures and elements to add character to the space. From opening up ceilings to expose the bones of the building to incorporating interior windows and more, the design approach is meant to put the art itself in the limelight while still providing inspiration for the artists.

Incorporated Art

Also incorporated in the design is a large, blank wall on the front façade to display a mural. The mural could be designed by a local artist, and the idea is that it could be ever-changing with new artists adding to it or creating new designs.

Yolanda and the Platt/Whitelaw design team also saw potential for art incorporated on the exterior of the building. The stucco walls will remain light-colored and plain so that art can be displayed or projected on them. As a complement to the exterior of the building, lighting will be recessed behind a perforated metal ribbon that stands in relief near the top of the building. That lighting can be adjusted to project different colors and movement through the screen material.

“The major underlying concept for our design was for the entire building, with all its history embedded in the bones of the structure, to be a canvas for the community’s local artists to express their thoughts and ideas on the structure,” said Platt/Whitelaw’s Principal Naveen Waney.

Moving Forward

Slated for completion near the end of 2023, our team may find additional surprises in this unique building as construction progresses. We also know those surprises could inspire even more creative design possibilities.

We are grateful to the City of Chula Vista and former Mayor Mary Casillas Salas for the opportunity to design this important and inspiring community space.

Welcome, Andrew and Emma! One Family’s Surrogacy Journey

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A Story of Perseverance and of a Tiny Country’s Very Big Role in Changing a Family’s Life.

In May and July of 2023, the Platt/Whitelaw Architects’ second generation grew by two. We’ve celebrated many Platt/Whitelaw babies over the firm’s 60+ years, but Andrew and Emma had extraordinary journeys into this world.

Building Family Through Surrogacy

These tiny architects-in-training (we can dream, right?) were born to the same parents, one-and-a-half months apart from one another, with help from two Georgian surrogates. Not Georgia the U.S. state, Georgia the country.

Each year, thousands of would-be parents for whom pregnancy is biologically prohibited or unsafe medically, turn to surrogacy. Dr. Barry Witt, a reproductive endocrinologist, OBGYN and Medical Director with WINFertility, told The Today Show that an estimated 3,000 to 4,000 babies are born through surrogacy each year in the U.S.

It’s an emotionally taxing and deeply personal journey. Platt/Whitelaw Associate Thomas Brothers is sharing about it for two reasons.

First, it’s kind of cool. “Not everyone gets to live through this alternate reality and also spend time in a fantastic country on the other side of the world,” he said.

Even more important is Thomas’ second reason.

“People go through struggles in life, but with help and support networks, you get through them. That’s worth sharing. If you’re open to help and people are open to helping, you can get through some pretty dark things.”

So, this is the story of some dark things and the many lights at the end of the tunnel.

The Leap of Faith

It didn’t take long for Thomas and his wife to learn that staying in the U.S. for their surrogacy journey would cost well over $100,000, with little to no help from insurance. It was a blow, but they started researching surrogacy in other countries. They were very careful to search for a country that protects its surrogates from exploitation.

They learned about Georgia first from a family friend, then from an article written by an Australian who used a Georgian surrogate. The author was pleased with the support and communication afforded to all parties.

Even better, they learned of Chachava Clinic, a delivery/fertility hospital in Tbilisi that also offered surrogacy services to foreigners. Through Chachava, they were able to match with two surrogates. They were also part of a WhatsApp group with the surrogacy agency and their gestational carrier. (Gestational carrier means when the egg is not the carrier’s own egg.)

Navigating Hurdles

They chose two surrogates simultaneously because they wanted two children, and implanting more than one embryo can put the carrier and fetuses at risk. Accordingly, Georgian medical standards limit transfers to one embryo when embryos have been pre-tested, as theirs were. With the cost of travel and temporary residency in another country, they knew their overseas surrogacy journey would happen only once.

Thomas and his wife also needed to account for the possibility of multiple embryo transfers being needed and the cost of shipping the embryos to Georgia from the U.S. in the first place.

Here, again, they found help online. Through various chat rooms and social media groups, they found another family to team up with to ship embryos to Chachava, and thereby reduce the specialty shipping fee for each family.

Ultimately, Thomas and his wife were fortunate that both of their surrogates became pregnant, though 1.5 months apart. Now, they would need to arrive in Georgia a safe distance before the first due date but stay through the second due date — and the time it would take to process all the paperwork required to leave the country with their children.

Paving the Path Forward

Knowing all that would be required of them once the due dates neared, Thomas and his wife decided to take a scouting trip to Tbilisi well before the due dates. While there, they identified temporary living quarters, got to know the city and its resources, went through their documentation with the lawyer at the clinic and met both surrogates.

They also got to meet up with a group of foreigners who were at various stages in their surrogacy journey. It was a valuable exchange of information and emotional support.

The couple spent months planning their experience, including learning about wait times and information that would be required to secure birth certificates and passports after the kids’ births. They were ready.

Hitting the Ground Running

They arrived in Georgia for the second time two weeks before Andrew’s due date. Flying halfway around the world is grueling, and the time change is impactful. As soon as they reached their rental home, they fell asleep.

They awoke the next morning to a message that Andrew was on his way, two weeks early! They arrived at the clinic just after he was born and then spent a few days in the clinic with Andrew and their surrogate partner. They returned to their Tbilisi home and spent six weeks as a one-baby family… until Emma was born early, too!

“Ultimately, we spent more than two months living in a bubble in Tbilisi,” said Thomas. “We established a routine. Then, five days after Emma’s passport interview, we were on a plane back to the U.S.”

Reflections

Things certainly didn’t slow down when Thomas and his family arrived home.

Sleeping is hard. The babies haven’t been on the same schedule at all and are at different developmental stages.

“You’re more aware of every developmental step because it happens twice but close together,” Thomas said, adding that, although it comes with challenges, this is one aspect of parenting he enjoys most.

He’s grateful to work at a family-friendly firm and can take time for family obligations. In addition to working up a reserve of vacation time before the birth of his children, Thomas was able to work remotely.

“Platt/Whitelaw made sure I had a laptop and helped me set up a VPN so I could work in Georgia,” Thomas said. “Our leadership let me know that I had a safe landing space when I was ready to come back. It was tremendous to have that security in such an otherwise stressful time.”

Thomas is grateful to Georgia, also. In addition to the wonderful people involved in their surrogacy journey, they developed a love for the country.

“Georgia is a tiny country that’s fiercely independent,” Thomas said. “It has its own language and alphabet, and a whole lot of spirit.”

Lessons Learned for the Surrogacy Journey

For Thomas and his family, there were many lights at the end of the tunnel, with Andrew and Emma being the brightest, of course.

He hopes everyone turning to surrogacy can receive the support along the way that he and his wife did.

“My best piece of advice is to get into support groups – online or on social media,” Thomas said. “You get important access to people going through the same thing and pooling resources. The surrogacy journey we took can feel lonely, scary and overwhelming, and you don’t know how or when it’s going to end. It’s painful but also an opportunity if you let yourself be open to it.”

James Mason Joins Platt/Whitelaw Architects

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Senior Project Coordinator Excels at Community-Based Architecture

The Platt/Whitelaw team is a tapestry of diverse backgrounds and talents. Our newest member, James Mason, adds a unique thread to our rich fabric. James has a passion for creating exceptional spaces and a portfolio of people-centric projects that both anchor and elevate their surrounding communities.

“Throughout my career, I’ve been privileged to work on a multitude of community serving projects from start to finish,” James said. From programming and design through construction and closeout, the entirety of James’ career has centered on bringing public and community-based projects to life.

He joins our firm as a senior project coordinator.

A Path to Serving Others

James’ interest in design was sparked in high school. While he harbored an interest in art, his limited drawing skills posed a hurdle. His mother’s keen eye and wisdom would set him on a different path.

“She suggested I take drafting so I could use a straight edge,” James joked. “I never looked back.”

Raised in the Lone Star State, James studied architecture at the University of Texas, San Antonio, where he met his wife, Rita, a Carlsbad native. Early in his career, he gravitated toward public projects. While he doesn’t consider this an intentional choice, it’s one he’s wholly embraced.

Over his 20+ year career, he’s worked closely with local groups and organizations to ensure the schools, libraries, life safety facilities, hospitals and other spaces he’s designed positively impact communities.

When asked about his proudest career moment, James pauses. He then describes the wonder and awe he witnessed when children — and adults alike — entered the Texas State Aquarium’s Caribbean Journey. The 71,000-sqaure-foot exhibit had been decades in the making. In 2017, right before James relocated to San Diego, the aquarium’s epic adventure through coastal forests, Mayan Ruins, a shipwreck and coral reefs opened to the public. James had successfully brought the human and animal worlds together.

James says he also cherishes memories at school opening, and reopening, events when school principals couldn’t contain their tears of joy. They knew the new spaces would profoundly impact student lives.

Strengthening the local community

Coming from a larger firm solely focused on educational design, James was drawn to Platt/Whitelaw’s diversity of projects, more personal and engaging work environment and tangible community impact.

Today, he works closely with the County of San Diego to transform behavioral healthcare services. He leads the East Region Crisis Stabilization Unit project. It’s a center, in the heart of downtown El Cajon, that will provide individuals with immediate mental health and substance abuse support and treatment services in a therapeutic setting.

Simultaneously, he leads the restoration of the Old Logan Heights Library building. The project requires a delicate balance to preserve its historical integrity while ensuring modern usability and accessibility.

Committed to Protecting the Past

Beyond his design pursuits, James finds fulfillment in preserving his community’s history through both its architectural and human connections. James spent many years with the San Antonio Conservation Society helping safeguard the city’s residential structures over a century old. Today, he connects with his aging, often isolated, neighbors in Oceanside by volunteering with Meals on Wheels.

Teaching Toward an Inclusive Architecture Industry

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Yolanda Velazco, a top-notch designer at Platt/Whitelaw, is more than just an architecture instructor teaching at Southwestern College.

Having grown up in Mexico, and even having attended Southwestern College herself, Yolanda knows that navigating a college experience in a different country comes with a learning curve. Many of her students at Southwestern College grew up in Mexico.

Un-clashing cultures

“They’re coming from a different system, and there’s culture shock, too, even though we’re a border city,” said Yolanda. “Many know some English, but I can see how they struggle when they try to get into classes and things like that. I can help provide more than just an architectural education because I understand what they’re going through.”

She has provided this help through her stints teaching Studio 1, Studio 2 and Introduction to Architecture at Southwestern College in Chula Vista. This fall will mark her third semester of teaching.

“I’ve taught students of all ages and from very diverse backgrounds,” she said. “Some of my students are older than me. Some already finished their degree in architecture in Mexico. Regardless, I try to focus on how the system works as much as how to design.”

Yolanda says that she and some of her fellow teaching instructors have thought about creating a class focused on the differences between architecture in the U.S. and in Mexico, because those differences can be so stark.

Well-rounded education

Yolanda was surprised that the Introduction to Architecture class became her favorite to teach, even though the studio classes inspire her when her students push the boundaries of design and present new ideas.

“I share a lot of my experiences in the Introduction to Architecture class, and we talk about every aspect of what they may find themselves doing with an architecture education,” she said.

A lot of the course is driven by questions from the students themselves.

“I want them to feel more comfortable and informed about the decision they’re making,” she added. “I don’t want them to be scared, but I try to be realistic. I think about what I would have liked to know as a student.”

Fortunately, it’s a student body that’s not likely to scare easily.

“My students are super hard workers. Most are attending school while working full time,” said Yolanda.

Breaking barriers

While their drive is admirable, the students’ economic circumstances can be daunting when they think about supplementing the two-year associate degree they can earn at Southwestern College with a follow-on, baccalaureate degree.

“The closest public college they can attend to earn that full degree is California State University Pomona,” said Yolanda, who is a graduate of that program. “It’s difficult to get in, even as a transfer. You submit your portfolio, and based on that, they could send you down to first year, which would mean you’d still have to do five years of study.”

NewSchool of Architecture & Design is in San Diego, but it’s private and may be cost-prohibitive for some. If Southwestern students want to pursue a four- or five-year degree at either institution, they will need to pay rent if living away from family and will probably have less hours to work a job.

It’s this plight that has inspired Southwestern College to apply for the right to offer a baccalaureate degree (four- or five-year degree) in Architecture. Time will tell if the effort succeeds.

“We’ve been creating an elite major,” says Yolanda. She’s concerned that barriers exist to getting more minorities and people of color into architecture.

“Coming to Platt/Whitelaw made me feel comfortable because its leadership is diverse,” she said, but she added that it hadn’t been her impression of most architecture firms she had encountered.

Platt/Whitelaw Architects Principal Naveen Waney said, “Yolanda is a creative, motivated, strong-minded person. Once she gets something in her head, she will make sure she explores the subject to the fullest and returns with a responsive solution. That’s a trait you cannot teach and makes her a great teacher for budding architects.”

Words of advice

Yolanda also wants to make sure that architecture students master foundational skills.

“I feel with the technology and all tools available now, we’re losing the basics,” she said. “As a student, it’s hard to understand why hand drafting is important, but you always need to know the basics first to effectively use technology as a tool. I feel like I get picky about how graphics should look and plans should read, but those are your instructions to the person who’s going to build it.”

She added one last piece of advice for up-and-coming architects.

“You’re not supposed to know it all. Ask questions. There’s so much information out there.”

Envisioning San Diego’s New Oak Park Library

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Leveraging Platt/Whitelaw’s Library Architectural Design Experience

In the late 1960s, our firm’s founder, Robert Platt, designed the Oak Park Library on 54th Street. More than 50 years later, we’re again serving the communities of Oak Park, Webster and Chollas Creek by helping to create a new library.

Next Steps for the Oak Park Library

Platt/Whitelaw Architects is working hand-in-hand with the City of San Diego, with input from the Friends of the Oak Park Library, to craft a request for proposals (RFP) for the design and construction of a brand-new library.

The new and larger library will be built less than a mile away on a greenfield site the city owns just southwest of Chollas Lake Park. It sits just west of the city’s operations yard on College Grove Drive.

The city received state funding for the 20,000-square-foot library as well as a 10,000-square foot sorting facility.

Designing a Library Sorting Facility

The sorting facility serves the entire City of San Diego Library system and replaces one currently at the city’s operations yard. Returned books from all the city’s libraries are sent here, fed into a system of scanners, conveyor belts, levers and chutes and then redistributed to libraries.

This unique building requires accessible loading docks and easy circulation without negatively impacting the views and experience at the adjacent library.

Architects writing RFPs

It’s uncommon for an architecture firm to be hired to craft a public agency RFP, but the city saw the wisdom in it for a couple of reasons.

The city hired Platt/Whitelaw partly because of the steep site. The buildings must be configured and sited carefully, and a new traffic light and driveway is required for access and circulation. Involving an architect early in the process will provide additional clarity for the design-build team ultimately selected.

Another reason to hire us is community outreach. Friends of the Oak Park Library is a very active library booster group, and the city wanted a team familiar with not just library architecture but also with leading public outreach and design charettes. The city knew this collaboration between Platt/Whitelaw and the Friends group would elevate the library vision articulated in the RFP.

The resulting library design and space planning program requested in the RFP specifies an idea/maker lab, computer stations spaced throughout the library, multiple study rooms and a homework room. Lacking a large community room or a place for kids to hangout nearby, Friends of the Oak Park Library advocated for the 3,250-square-foot multi-purpose room that we included also.

Design/build teams responding to the RFP will be asked to incorporate public art inside and outside the library. They will also need to provide space for displays in the library lobby.

Community Engagement and Far-Out Ideas

Someday, thanks to an idea from one Friends of Oak Park Library member, the site may also include an observatory. While the cost exceeds what the city has available to spend now, the RFP asks the design-build team to set aside space for an observatory in the future.

The idea was inspired by a similar library-observatory facility in Riverside County, California that was created to provide children from underserved communities a chance to experience astronomy, astrophysics and more.

Teamwork and Shared Visions

The RFP for the Oak Park Library and sorting facility is scheduled for release this fall. While our firm can’t submit for the project work, our Oak Park Library RFP team of Peter Soutowood and Emad Abdulwajid is proud to play an important part in its vision.

From the original Oak Park Library architect Robert Platt to the designers energizing our firm more than 50 years later, our staff cares deeply about designing libraries and other community facilities.

We’d like to conclude by recognizing some of the people who were instrumental in securing the funding for the new Oak Park Library: Claudine Thompson, Senate President pro Tem Toni Atkins and Assemblywoman Dr. Akilah Weber, who grew up in Oak Park. We’d also like to thank Monica Arredondo and Abdirahman Osman at the City of San Diego as well as Misty Jones, the San Diego Public Library Director.

 

Culturally Centric Design for Memory Care Facilities

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Many of our designers started as students at NewSchool of Architecture & Design. Some of our staff taught at NewSchool, and we have a long history of taking on NewSchool interns. We’re proud to announce that Emad Abdulwajid, our most recent NewSchool intern, is now our newest full-time staff member!

Emad just completed his senior thesis, and it’s a great example of why we think so highly of both Emad and NewSchool.

Emad’s thesis imagined an architectural plan for a memory care facility tailored to Indian immigrants.

From a design perspective, memory care facilities in the U.S., according to Emad, “usually cater to the culture they’re in, but the U.S. is a melting pot.”

People of other cultures are not immune to memory loss, but family members don’t feel comfortable housing their loved ones in a residential environment that doesn’t feel familiar.

Emad drew from personal experience. One of his family members is experiencing dementia, and Emad noticed that this loved one was more comfortable while visiting India, where he grew up.

“A lot of memory loss patients revert back to a childlike sense and what they grew up with is more familiar,” said Emad.

To inform his design, Emad relied on research journals and case studies. He also reviewed photos he had taken on trips to India and identified the commonalities between the architecture of different villages. He even conducted feedback interviews with stakeholders representing his target audience.

He designed a dense, compact village that pulled in defining points of Indian architecture by using distinctive window design, apertures, screening systems, roof tiles and more.

His design was well received by his professors. They encouraged him to push the Indian details and architectural language even further if he ever has the chance to bring this unique idea to fruition.

Emad would welcome the opportunity. Substantial growth in demand for memory care facilities is projected in the U.S. in the next 10 years. Moreover, culturally grounded design could help overcome the cultural stigma felt by many third world immigrants about putting their parents in care facilities.

“We need to offer a better sense of the life they want and that they remember,” said Emad.

Emad spent two quarters of his last school year developing his thesis project, but we think the idea will have relevance for years to come. For any senior living developers out there, we have a great architectural firm in mind for a culturally centric memory care project (hint, hint), and you know who will be on that team!