Analysing 'The Architecture of Hope':
Page 35: ‘The interior also has a maximum contrast with the black, and it is this light-filled whiteness put into direct contact with nature – the trees and the hollow below – that becomes the basic experience of the patient.’ Page 35: ‘Foreign Office Architects in Newcastle and Rem Hoolhaas in Glasgow are designing centres that defer to the gardens above them, or they wrap around. The landscape becomes, through contrast, the primary subject.’ It is apparent that one of the key aspects to implement calm within the Maggies Centres is the integration of the surrounding landscape and elements of nature.
Page 36: ‘Richard Rogers with Ivan Harbour, Maggie’s Centre, 2008. The exterior at a bust street intersection leads to an inward-looking wall building with a hovering canopy of a roof. Dan Pearson’s garden surrounds the walls and penetrates them. Page 37: ‘Richard Rogers designed the London centre aware of such contradictory requirements … The orange-red colour, a good stimulant for those feeling weak, is probably also an echo of Chinese red’.
Easing the atmosphere of the space with a warm, uplifting colouration of red. Whether this method would likely be effective in terms of an animal is questionable - as dogs views on colours are vastly limited. Page 37: ‘As metaphor the building is a ‘simple ‘garden-pavilion’ surmounted by a roof with cut-out holes. These openings, with their lightweight louvers in white, give a very attractive dappled light.’ CAN MAGGIE’S CENTRES MAKE A DIFFERENCE? What have they all got in common? Page 38: ‘This layout is reminiscent of 1880s domestic architecture in the UK and USA … Frank Lloyd Wright developed this flowing space, centred around a inglenook and fireplace, and his early Prairie Houses show the kind of open and closed rooms that Maggie’s Centres also develop. These spaces, like Wright’s, combine semi-public living room with entry and stairs as a continuous sequence, but sliding partitions and visual and acoustic privacy are equally sought.’ Page 38: ‘Also accounting for their success is interest in the big question, the query that modern hospitals raise, and that architects, the public and the paymasters are trying hard to fathom … what effect do Maggie’s Centres have on health, and on survival? … The architecture of hope is a projective enterprise involving future cultural effects, and these are ultimately unpredictable.’
Page 38: ‘In the 1960s many post-modern writers pointed out that the fundamental goal of modern architecture – to change society for the better – was badly put and ideologically motivated … Indeed, the ideology of architecture improving society had evolved from Vitruvius through the Renaissance until, with the modernists, it became much more powerful, and underpinned by socialism.’ Page 38: ‘The strong version of this professional attitude resulted in ‘architectural determinism’ – the belief that architecture and a city’s layout determine a culture’s daily life and people’s behaviour. Page 39: ‘Weak Architectural Persuasion (WAP), is much more complex and hard to measure … WAP sounds irrefutable, especially because it does not specify any conditions. It is vaguely general.’ Page 39: ‘By now most cancer professionals must be aware of the psychiatrist David Spiegel’s discovery (so surprising to himself) that amongst his breast cancer patients at Stanford University, those who took part in group therapy lived some eighteen months longer than those who did not … Yet some people are confused about what this kind of evidence means. It refers less to the effect of architecture on health and much more to the work and ethos of what goes on with self-help groups, and the service inside the buildings.’ Despite not necessarily pinpointing the health-benefiting architecture, it states that it all acts as a complimentary package. The architecture can help, but the purposely built structure allows the methods and social activities to occur here effectively,
Page 40: ‘The British Design journal Blueprint ran a headline story on ten years of Maggie’s Centres with the provocative title ‘Can Architecture Beat Cancer?’ … This was an absurd position, I answered. How could one believe architecture had such amazing powers? … There is a lot of architectural passion invested in the hope that buildings can determine behaviour, and a lot of WAPs getting confused with SADs (strong architectural determinism). … ‘ask the more focused question about Maggie’s centres: can their activities make a difference?’ Page 40: ‘it is also now a standard science that excessive stress impairs the immune system. Since Maggie’s Centres alleviate negative stress by teaching patients how to navigate through the problems that come with cancer’. Page 40: ‘Transforming behaviour will inevitably play some role. The positive feelings and complementary therapies that patients get at the centres encourage many of them to change their diet, to exercise and relax’. Page 41: ‘Architecture only plays a supporting role in the plot. It amplifies the message of the carers, the way the activities are performed, the feelings of the main actors, that is the staff and the patients (not the architects). Page 41: ‘There is, however, a fascinating twist to the question of architectural effect. By a strange paradox there are a few cases where there is a negative case to be made for ‘strong architectural determinism’ … The setting was a BBC debate on health and architecture … I said that one should support good architecture for itself not because it would change patient care or determine behaviour, while the doctor pointed out the reverse.’ Page 41: ‘He argued that if a hospital creates a horrible or ugly environment then he and the nurses simply did not show up for work … So, really bad architecture can make a difference, and lead to absenteeism … But such cases are rare’.
Heathcote projects his opinion that architecture is only one element of the entire progress of stress-reduction, rehabilitating the mind. Good architecture emits a safe, effective, calming shell of which the necessary activities take place. It is when architecture is very bad that likewise it is capable of emitting harsh, deterioratitive effects on its inhabitants / users. Page 41: ‘What I think the Maggie’s Centres do show is the more modest truth that weak architectural persuasion can contribute to the workings of a group when its symbolism and ambience support the central message of the organisation. It does this by appealing to various moods … In a secondary sense the buildings support a positive mood, and then that affects the service we provide. In effect, the buildings are one important link in a positive feedback.’ Page 41: ‘What then is the overall effect of the architecture? … But we have seen over the twelve years of growth a pattern of appreciation that deserves special emphasis. With their striking forms and friendly atmosphere, and the contrast to the normal NHS building, the architecture sends a very clear message to the vulnerable that they matter, that their illness is important to us and to society. It gives recognition, as did such hospitals as the Hospices de Beaune …’ Page 42: ‘Another doctor emphasised that Maggie’s has changed a lot of people’s views about how much architecture can influence the way people feel. A third, at yet another hospital, said that Maggie’ helps [patients] to move on to a new phase … it’s non-physical: you could almost say spiritual. Probably the best way to describe it is it’s about heart.’ Page 42: ‘Maggie’s Highland is a very clever design, like a boat. It’ s a completely different sort of space, none of the walls are straight, all the doors are curved … Such is the effect of highly metaphorical buildings that they alter moods, change how people see things, even doctors. Patients are normally treated in a hygienic atmosphere that is impersonal – the white cube. So then, when they walk into a colourful place of great personality, they perk up and respond emotionally, seeing reality in a different way.’
Linking this theory back to my project, the purpose is to manipulate the stereotypical perspection of a kennel / shelter environment. Provide a means of sanitary housing for these animals, but through positive architecture elliminate the current negative connotations. [Regarding the senior vice-president of Santa Monica visiting one of the Maggie’s centres] Page 42: ‘Walking from the hospital into Maggie’s is a concretisation of hope – just as the daffodil reminds us of spring.’
(Heathcote E. and Jencks, C., 2010. The Architecture Of Hope' - Maggies Cancer Caring Centres. Frances Lincoln.)