The Kontula district in eastern Helsinki has a new senior citizens’ home, which incorporates novel concepts taking advantage of the latest information available on care for the mentally impaired and senior citizens. The home operates in a new building designed by Brunow & Maunula Architects. 

 

The home is equipped with technology aimed at easing the lives of mentally impaired residents and increasing safety. Passage control is based on finger-print recognition. Carpets that recognize the people who step on them are used to monitor resident movement at nighttime. Every room is equipped with care-personnel alarm buttons. Bathrooms and saunas are surfaced with anti-microbiological coatings – the first such coatings in the municipal sector in Finland.

 

The home is divided into 13-room complexes, with individual living units and kitchens and shared communal spaces. Balconies are designed especially for the mentally impaired, allowing them increased opportunities for unassisted movement.

 

JKMM Architects and Helsinki Deaconess Institute have won a design competition for a homeless people’s centre in Helsinki, to be built on a City site in central Helsinki.

 

The proposal, named Rafael, is for a home with 50 units for men and women suffering from mental disorders and substance abuse, who need 24-hour overseeing. The competition sought to find innovative service concepts and a real-estate model to serve these concepts. The winner is a consortium that can implement the entire project from building design and construction to service provision.

 

Rafael combines resident privacy and a community concept: residents are placed in units according to their need and capability for interaction and not according to needs for care. The concept helps them to reintegrate into society.   

 

The homeless project is part of a programme to reduce long-term homelessness by the Housing Finance and Development Centre of Finland (ARA).