Materialising architecture for social  care: brick walls and compromises in design for later life.

Sarah Nettleton; Daryl Martin; Christina Buse; Lindsay Prior

doi:10.1111/1468-4446.12722

Materialising architecture for social care: brick walls and compromises in design for later life.

Sarah Nettleton, Daryl Martin, Christina Buse, Lindsay Prior

Sociology

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

Abstract

This article reports on an ethnography of architectural projects for later life social care in the UK. Informed by recent debates in material studies and ‘materialities of care’ we offer an analysis of a care home project that is sensitive to architectural materials that are not normally associated with care and wellbeing. Although the care home design project we focus on in this article was never built, we found that design discussions relating to both a curved brick wall and bricks more generally were significant to its architectural ‘making’. The curved wall and the bricks were used by the architects to encode quality and values of care into their design. This was explicit in the design narrative that was core to a successful tender submitted by a consortium comprising architects, developers, contractors, and a care provider to a local authority who commissioned the care home. However, as the project developed, initial consensus for the design features fractured. Using a materialised analysis, we document the tussles generated by the curved wall and the bricks and argue that mundane building materials can be important to, and yet marginalised within, the relations inherent within an ‘architectural care assemblage.’ During the design process we saw how decisions about materials are contentious and they act as a catalyst of negotiations that compromise ‘materialities of care.’

Original language	English
Number of pages	16
Journal	British Journal of Sociology
Early online date	19 Dec 2019
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1111/1468-4446.12722
Publication status	E-pub ahead of print - 19 Dec 2019

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10.1111/1468-4446.12722Licence: CC BY

Nettleton_et_al-2019-The_British_Journal_of_Sociology
© 2019 The Authors. The British Journal of Sociology published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of London School of Economics and Political Science
Final published version, 360 KBLicence: CC BY

Cite this

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title = "Materialising architecture for social care: brick walls and compromises in design for later life.",

abstract = "This article reports on an ethnography of architectural projects for later life social care in the UK. Informed by recent debates in material studies and {\textquoteleft}materialities of care{\textquoteright} we offer an analysis of a care home project that is sensitive to architectural materials that are not normally associated with care and wellbeing. Although the care home design project we focus on in this article was never built, we found that design discussions relating to both a curved brick wall and bricks more generally were significant to its architectural {\textquoteleft}making{\textquoteright}. The curved wall and the bricks were used by the architects to encode quality and values of care into their design. This was explicit in the design narrative that was core to a successful tender submitted by a consortium comprising architects, developers, contractors, and a care provider to a local authority who commissioned the care home. However, as the project developed, initial consensus for the design features fractured. Using a materialised analysis, we document the tussles generated by the curved wall and the bricks and argue that mundane building materials can be important to, and yet marginalised within, the relations inherent within an {\textquoteleft}architectural care assemblage.{\textquoteright} During the design process we saw how decisions about materials are contentious and they act as a catalyst of negotiations that compromise {\textquoteleft}materialities of care.{\textquoteright}",

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