ARCH_500-600 Comprehensive Options Studio: ‘Habilitation Learning Center’

Since Carolyn Baum, PhD, and Charles Christiansen, EdD, developed the Person-Environment-Occupation-Performance (PEOP) model in 1985, it has become key to understanding occupational performance, the role of cognition in everyday life, and enabled daily activity in people with chronic health conditions and disability.

“Habilitation” is a therapeutic approach that promotes healthy functioning in older people using the PEOP model, with an emphasis on emotional well-being. In this studio, students designed a Habilitation Learning Center, a 10,000-square-foot extension to the north wing of the Program in Occupational Therapy at Washington University in St. Louis. The project had to include state-of-the-art clinic spaces, classrooms, research labs, simulation rooms, and indoor and outdoor collaborative spaces to promote interactions between faculty and students, therapists and patients, and more importantly occupational therapy clinic and research groups.

Students collaborated closely with leaders, faculty from the program, and facility management to address the following four areas of design and research concerns: 1) design of the location, context, function, flow, connection, and community engagement; 2) design of the space program and building configuration, including orientation, structure, material, form, indoor/outdoor spaces, landscape, and spaces for social interaction; 3) research on environmental attributes, including interior styles, sensory/color stimulation, lighting, privacy, and safety; and 4) design of sustainable passive and building systems.

Professors and medical practitioners from the Program in Occupational Therapy delivered lectures and reviews, including: Carolyn Baum, PhD, Lisa Connor, PhD, Jessica Dashner, Xiaobo Quan, PhD, and Donna Ware (BJC HealthCare). Several local architects and designers also provided lectures and expert reviews, including: David Polzin and Ruofei Sun, PhD, (Cannon Design), Dan Hellmuth (Hellmuth + Bicknese), David Kromm (KRJ Planning and Research), and Luke Leung and Yue Zhu (SOM).