INTRODUCTION
“…Buildings, spaces between them…make different lives, influence how we think,
feel, behave-how we are’.3
Many specialists of various fields, including sociologists, therapists and architects
have repeatedly argued about how place and the design of its spaces communicate
with the human psyche, affect the way in which people react to their lives and how
they develop. And this might be said to be rather crucial for any individual who
requires long term constant care or needs to recover from a period of physical, social
and emotional instability such as the multi-faceted break down and loss of self
brought about by drug addiction. It is important to note from the outset that
architecture is not a treatment, but can most significantly become part of the healing
process through the creation of spaces that foster and provide meaning to those
activities utilized to achieve gradual rehabilitation through a therapeutic
environment. Light, colour and movement within a residence as well as landscape
and location are essential elements of this architectural therapy and the paper will
seek to bring their relevance to the fore in the 2nd part of this paper.
“..form and space can be insidious shapers of person and community or they can
nourish and spur development, both social and individual”.4
It is a setting which readies for social inclusion and does not bunch up people as a
group of patients who simply need to take their medication or stay indoors for a
prolonged period of time but as active recipients of change and individuality. Not
merely a number behind a ‘health facility’ door. Architectural design can provide the
corner stone of this individuality, with spaces built as an interactive process as
opposed to ‘holding a disorder within’. As Cynthia Leibrock puts it, even the little
things in the design of a building can play their part in the psychology of the healing
equation; such as the way windows reflect the sunlight in a therapeutic community
residence.
“…The power of a healing environment comes from the design details that empower
patients to take responsibility for their own health’.5
Before delving into how building design can interconnect with the healing process
and activities in providing healing for individuals with long term recurring drug
addiction problems, one must provide a detailed outlook of the approach that can
serve this type of architecture-drug addiction rehabilitation approach. And this is the
concept, or rather the healing principle of the therapeutic community, a relatively