Artur Gała, a student at the Faculty of Architecture at the Silesian University of Technology also took up the challenge of the international competition "Hospice - Home for terminally ill" organized by the Bee Breeders platform. His design for a green hospice that brings solace to patients by surrounding them with nature won the BB Student Award!
The goal of the "Hospice - Home for terminallyill" competition was to design a space where terminally ill people can seek respite, convalesce and receive support in their fight against the disease. The competition's hospice would serve as a center that patients can visit daily for advice and even companionship during treatment.
The green hospice project won the BB Student Award
© Artur Gala
The task gave participants a chance to experiment with architecture as a tool to help the sick, and allowed them to show how architecture can bring mental relief. We wrote about the detailed guidelines and the composition of the jury, as part of the Into the Garden project by the Gierbienis + Poklewski studio and students of the Krakow University of Technology, which received as many as two awards: the grand prize and the BB Green Award.
One of the therapy rooms overlooking the rich vegetation
© Artur Gała
BB Student Award for Artur Gała
Among the awarded works was the Green Hospice project by Artur Gała, a fifth-year architecture student at the Silesian University of Technology. The jury awarded him the BB Student Award for the best student work.
The biggest challenge in the competition was to work on a very sensitive subject, requiring understanding and a careful approach. Death is an inevitable phenomenon. Despite the tremendous advances in knowledge, science and technology, human life is associated with helplessness and the hardship of complicity in suffering. For this reason, there is a constant search for ways to die well. The doctrine of mercy based on love of neighbor has contributed to the introduction of palliative medicine. "Pallium" means cloak/clothing, so palliative care can be understood as assistance given with kindness during the inevitable stage of life for the terminally ill," explains Artur Gala.
Greenery grows behind the glass structure all year round
© Artur Gała
green hospice
The goal of the author of the green hospice was to focus on the patient, who at the end of his life can receive mental help and support in the designed building. According to the young architect - mental health deterioration can be especially aggravated in patients who live in concrete cities far from nature. That's why he designed the building according to the principles of biophilic design.
The main body containing the hospice rooms was enclosed in a glass structure
© Artur Gala
The main body containing the hospice rooms was enclosed in a glass structure, which guarantees acoustic comfort and the possibility of communing with the greenery growing there all year round, regardless of the weather. The interiors are dominated by natural materials, which, together with a large number of plants, bring the patients and users of the building closer to nature. The author used photovoltaic panels on part of the roof and took care of rainwater. It is drained from the roof into rainwater tanks and then used for flushing and watering vegetation.
The hospice consists of six levels
© Artur Gała
Therapy rooms, nurses' rooms, a chapel and a meeting room are locatedon the ground and second floors. A garden is located on the second floor. Another level is devoted to a library and rooms for people coming from farther cities in need of accommodation. On the top floor there is a kitchen with a dining room, a common area and a vegetable garden.
The top floor has a vegetable garden and a kitchen with a dining room
© Artur Gala
This is not Artur Gała's first project recognized in an international competition. Read about the hotel for artists, for which a student of Silesian Universityof Technology received an honorable mention in theHills of the Arts competition .
