HEALING ROOMS: reclaiming space for care and cure

The hospital experience

“As I lay in bed, listening to the orchestra of hospital sounds, I have an existential crisis. The fridge in the hallway is vibrating against the tiled wall. Two people are snoring, almost at the same time. Ambulances come in every few minutes. Someone is watching 'How I Met Your Mother'. Something is buzzing. The sink faucet drips from time to time. I can’t seem to figure out why I actually came here anymore. I am alone in a hospital bed with only a plastic bag filled with my belongings, a stranger is sleeping 70 centimeters away from me, and I can’t help but think of how miserable I feel. Why am I here? No one actively takes care of me, and I am way more uncomfortable than I was at home. I feel lonely and confused, not really able to process why this whole experience — that is supposed to help (in my mind at least) — makes me feel so much worse. Being sick is so inherently stressful, how did I think I would immediately adapt to this whole situation?”

The spatial reality

“Sterile white walls” — anyone would immediately think of a hospital room.
“Hospital lights” — the white fluorescent lights everyone hates.
“Hospital bed” — every time there’s a metal frame bed that’s slightly uncomfortable.

Hospital rooms (and hospitals in general) have the reputation of being notoriously ugly, uncomfortable, and unwelcoming. As clinical efficiency has taken over patient-centered care, the hospital has turned into a techno-utopia, and care has turned into cure.
In December 2022, I was unexpectedly hospitalized for 10 days. While I was aware that hospitals have the reputation of being notoriously ugly, uncomfortable, and unwelcoming, Room 23 stuck with me. The sounds, the bright lights, the schedule, the bed — everything about it was working against my recovery. My experience in Room 23 led to my investigation into hospital rooms: spaces where patients come for care and cure. As a spatial practitioner, I couldn’t help but notice the reality of these spaces: patient rooms don’t work for patients, but against them.

The installation

This project is an exploration of the intersection between physical space and emotional experience, in an attempt to make tangible the invisible struggles of a hospital stay. Healing Rooms is an exploration of patient rooms as an active component of healing, from the patient perspective, inviting visitors to experience the patient room as a space of vulnerability, routine disruption, and sensory overload.
The bed and nightstand replicate a standard patient setup. The model is a replica of Room 23 (the room I was hospitalized in) and adjacent rooms. Hospital recordings play through the headphones, depicting the continuous interruptions that define the hospital environment. The book brings together several layers: a personal account of my own hospital stay, a collection of experiences from other patients, historical references, and an architectural analysis of various patient room typologies.
Visitors are invited to put on shoe covers, lie down in the bed, wear the headphones, observe the model, read the publication, and fill in the survey. The installation is experienced individually and at your own pace.