Architecture of Care

The projected site is located in the central part of Berlin, administratively part of the Mitte district, directly bordering on the south-eastern side of the Kreuzberg district, to which the vibe fits much better. It is situated a short distance from the River Spree. The site is well connected, with the Ostbahnhof railway station located within 700 m, and the nearest Heinrich-Heine-Straße underground station at a similar distance.

The condition of existing buildings varied in between the objects. In order to know, which one should be demolished and which one should stay, their current condition was analyse.

Architecture of Care

Main topic of the thesis.

It consists of five steps, where the first four are the actual process and the 5th one evaluates the ones before.

1. Care about
Women experiencing domestic violence

The first step of care, is to notice and prioritise the need. The main difficulties noticed by the authors in the neighbourhood, as well as in whole Berlin, are the problems of marginalised people in crisis. The origin of those crisis, how the affected are helped and what other related issues can be taken into account in the care process. After analysing the issues, the authors decided to narrow down the priority of the group receiving help to women and people who identify as women, with a particular focus on the recovery of victims of domestic violence.

2. Care for
Assigning the responsibility

For this project, the responsibility for taking care of the identified need should be assigned to governmental organizations, ensuring continued access to help for those in need. For teaching purposes, the responsibility for solving this problem architecturally has been assigned to the authors of the work./

3. Care giving
Care about the environment

In addition to the main theme of the care - the creation of a women’s shelter, it is also important to examine how the planned facilities will be built and what impact they will have on the surrounding area. In this case, this is ensured by preserving existing structures as much as possible, thus reducing the carbon footprint that would be generated by demolishing them and erecting new ones in the same place. Caring for biodiversity and increasing the quantity and quality of green spaces in the area and integrating the local community.

4. Care receiving
A women’s home focused on the users

In addition to providing accommodation and meeting basic needs, it is also important to see how we can have an impact on the psychological well-being and faster recovery, on the residents’ career development, their opportunities, financial stability or where they will live when a particular phase of care is over. To this end, in addition to the women’s shelter, the authors have included a number of features that will not only help speed up recovery, but also provide financially accessible housing where women, once they leave the shelter, can spend the period of time needed to gain financial stability, or treat it as a final residence and stay there for longer.

5. Caring with
Evaluation of the whole process

After the care with stage occurs, which is an analysis of the initial assumptions. The target is to provide care for women struggling with crises. The shelter itself provides the basis for this assumption, i.e. shelter, but the aspects described in the preceding subsections concerning aspects beyond housing mean that the care process can run outside the standard framework of such a facility. Another point that can be considered in addition to this process is how we can prevent women from ending up in centres. In addition to making both women and men aware of their rights, meetings with psychologists or social actions drawing attention to the problem of violence, it is also important to change attitudes as to when the process of care should begin.

Design Wheel

The summary of the analysis and the theoretical part.