Henigsman / Innovations in prof. Stanko Kristl health space designs, their humanity, and today's relevance

Innovations in prof. Stanko Kristl health space designs, their humanity, and today's relevance

Author: Jure Henigsman, University of Ljubljana

Supervisor: Tadej Glažar, Prof., University of Ljubljana; Peter Šenk, Assoc. Prof., University of Maribor

Research stage: initial doctoral stage

Category: Extended abstract

Abstract

Despite their rapid development in the 20th century, the architectural profession often overlooked hospitals. They are ignored partly because of their complexity and the unpleasant unease that the feeling of a hospital gives us. We do not want to be admitted to them until we are ill, but we also want to be near them.

The development of the so-called Modern Hospital as we know it today was the result of international cooperation. The pressure on hospitals was further accelerated by high immigration to the cities and knowledge learned in the First World War. The rapid development of social infrastructure accelerated dramatically after World War II. Technological developments led to new hospital designs even more rapidly to meet the needs of the military and experts in medicine.

Prof. Stanko Kristl, a well-known Slovenian architect, has designed several projects of buildings for healing around the world from the 1970s to the present day. His buildings are intelligent and flexible. He has used several approaches and methods that he developed to design them. All his buildings have integrated humanity that was new in the time when they were constructed. These innovations are still admired and taken as examples today, even if they are not very well known in detail.

Today, the elements of Kristl's design are only very superficially known, especially in the design of healthcare buildings. We need to ask ourselves again what today's hospital buildings have to meet and offer. Do the health buildings we are building today meet the future needs for which they are built?

Keywords: Resilient Healthcare buildings, Design methods and approaches, Healing environment