Archive for the ‘Benefits of nature’ Category

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If you can only plant one thing, plant a tree

Friday, May 27th, 2011

White oak. Photo by Henry Domke, http://henrydomke.com

White oak. Photo by Henry Domke, henrydomke.com

The best friend of earth of man is the tree.  When we use the tree respectfully and economically, we have one of the greatest resources on the earth.
-   Frank Lloyd Wright

Let’s say you are designing a healing garden – for a client or yourself – and you only have 10 square feet of planting space. You could plant a few shrubs, or a few more perennials, or a bunch of annuals. Or you could plant a tree. If there’s enough vertical space, and there usually is, go for the tree. Why? Here are some reasons:

Shade
Shade is one of the most important components of any therapeutic landscape, and yet it is overlooked so often that sometimes I just want to cry. I’ve seen countless designs that might be successful if enough shade were provided for people to actually enjoy the garden even on hot, sunny days. I’m going to do a whole post on this soon, but I’ll point out a couple key things here. Especially in the healthcare setting, shade is crucial. Many people are “photosensitive” – sensitive to sun and bright light, either because of their condition or from the medication that they’re on. Imagine a garden in a cancer center without shade. I’ve seen those! If you include trees in your design, make sure they are big enough when they go in to provide shade right away. See that mother who is visiting her sick child and wants to sit with him under a nice, shady tree for a few minutes? Look her in the eye and tell her to come back in five years when the tree will be big enough to provide adequate shade. Or plant a big tree and watch as people gravitate to and gather under its soothing, protective boughs. Speaking of which…

Symbolism
You can’t beat trees for symbolism. They are so strong and resilient, and yet so graceful, flexible, and nurturing. And they can live for hundreds of years. Pretty inspiring. Furthermore, lots of trees are used for medicinal purposes. Even if a willow isn’t actually harvested for its analgesic properties, it can still be a good symbol of pain relief in a setting where healing is the goal.

Alone with myself
The trees bend to caress me
The shade hugs my heart.
~Candy Polgar

Sensory engagement
Sight is the most obvious sense, and we can appreciate a tree from a distance, from below looking up at the leaves and the patterns of light filtered through them, from above looking down through a window onto green rather than brown or grey. Remember Roger Ulrich’s seminal study* of patients recovering from surgery? The view that the patients had who recovered faster and needed pain medication was of a grove of trees. (more…)

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Posted in Backyard Sanctuary, Benefits of nature, Healing Garden, Healing landscapes, Plants and Horticulture, Research, seasonal interest | 3 Comments »

What is “nature,” anyway?

Thursday, May 19th, 2011
Martha's Vineyard beach. Photo by Naomi Sachs

Martha's Vineyard coastline. Photo by Naomi Sachs

A colleague posed an interesting question recently, in relation to providing access to nature in the healthcare setting: If we are arguing for access to nature in hospitals and other places of healing, then we shouldn’t we define it? Yes!

So, what is “nature”? Here are some thoughts.
Note that since posting this two days ago, I’ve already changed my definition slightly. I’m sure it will continue to evolve. Skip to the bottom of the post to see my latest definition as well as reference to an excellent article that has made me re-think my original one.

Let’s start with some dictionary definitions.

Nature:

Oxford English Dictionary:
- 1 the phenomena of the physical world collectively, including plants, animals, the landscape, and other features and products of the earth, as opposed to humans or human creations: “the breathtaking beauty of nature”
- the physical force regarded as causing and regulating these phenomena: “it is impossible to change the laws of nature” See also Mother Nature.

American Heritage Dictionary (dictionary.com)
1. the material world, especially as surrounding humankind and existing independently of human activities.
2. the natural  world as it exists without human beings or civilization.
3. the elements of the natural  world, as mountains, trees, animals, or rivers.

Natural is generally defined as “existing in or derived from nature; not made or caused by humankind.” (OED)

Naturalistic is usually defined as something that imitates nature: Plastic made to look like wood. A garden designed with soft, curving lines rather than hard, rectilinear ones (think Central Park and Piet Oudolf rather than Versailles and  Martha Schwartz).

In the past, and even in most dictionary definitions, nature is seen as separate from humans and everything made by them. More recent thinking, and I am in this camp, argues that we human beings are not – cannot be – separate from nature because we are living, breathing beings not all that far removed from our “natural” animal relatives. We are nature and nature is us.

So let’s agree that humans are a part of nature.
Then what of the things that we make (other than other humans)? What of concrete, and glass, and hybrid plants like tulips and roses, and cloned sheep? Which of those are nature, or natural, and which are…not? (more…)

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Posted in Benefits of nature, Discussion, Healing landscapes, Landscapes for Health | 10 Comments »

“Do care facilities care? Stats on the implementation of therapeutic landscapes.” Guest post by Tanya Goertzen

Thursday, May 5th, 2011
Montgomery Place Retirement Community Chicago, Illinois. Photo by Naomi Sachs

Montgomery Place Retirement Community, Chicago, Illinois. Photo by Naomi Sachs

This guest blog post is by Tanya Goertzen, Principal of People Places. Tanya initially posed the question to the TLN Group on Land8Lounge, and then took the initiative to do some research of her own. This blog post is a result of that research.

Do care facilities care? Stats on the implementation of therapeutic landscapes

When planning to undertake a specialization like therapeutic design, the additional investment of education to get there is a big commitment.  Keeping up to speed on current research and trends, conferences, publication reviews, etc. takes time and money.  So, is it worth it? We may be passionate about what we do, but does our target market see the value? The answer is a resounding “sometimes,” but the good news is, it’s likely an emerging trend that is growing.

Although no one specific study answers the question, data on the use of design research can help paint a picture.

The Center for Health Design (CHD) conducted surveys[1] in 2009 and 2010 of design research in healthcare settings. In both years, approximately 33% of respondents indicated they always implemented healing gardens. Sounds great, but unfortunately the results are skewed too positively by limited sampling, and are not representative of the health care market as a whole. As a benchmark, the 2010 survey indicated 41.6% always used design research to make design decisions; quite high when compared with the 2010 Health Facilities Management survey[2], in which only 16% always used design research. The latter survey is probably more representative of general trends because of broader sampling.

What is trending positively is the occasional use of design research, and possibly implementation of healing gardens. The occasional use of design research increased increased in the HFM survey from 25% in 2008, to 40% in 2009, and 60% in 2010. What may be closer to reality is around 33% of projects implemented healing gardens occasionally in 2010; an increase of 6.9% from 2009. While the trending is positive, those numbers are indeed small.

Looking to the future, that could all change. If, for example, “sometimes” means 50% of the time, then 16.5% of projects implemented healing gardens in 2010. If the growth rate continues, then that would be 51% in 2015.  Combine this with an aging population, and we could see a big increase in demand. In Canada alone, the number of seniors will more then double by 2036[3], and 3.4% (353 000) of those will likely live in seniors care facilities.[4]

A case can also be made that trends in therapeutic site design are not only represented by healing gardens, but also by trends in healing environments. A person’s outdoor experience of a facility is not just in gardens; wayfinding, loading, parking, waiting, socializing, exercising, etc., can all happen outside of gardens, and all influence stress reduction.[5] According to the CHD survey, the top feature being incorporated all of the time is healing environments that are nurturing, therapeutic, and reduce stress. All things, evidence suggests, supported by therapeutic landscapes. This seems to suggest that other members of the consultant design team, providers, vendors, and business developers may not understand that connection, so it remains up to the therapeutic site designer to educate, at least for the time being.

The future of therapeutic site design looks promising. No doubt, as the Center for Health Design continues its ground breaking work, and evidence-based design continues to grow, we can put aside the lofty guesswork above, and turn to better data.

Tanya Goertzen has been practicing site planning and design for 10 years, is a licensed member of the Canadian Society of Landscape Architects, and principal of People Places, a site planning and design firm for health care, educational and community places.  She holds a Bachelor of Environmental Design and a Master of Landscape Architecture, and is the recipient of the Award of Excellence in the study of Landscape Architecture; the Mennonite Student Travel Scholarship for her graduate work on community settlement patterns; and a winning exhibitor in the B.C. Drawing on the Land Exhibition; and has been featured in Sitelines.

Many thanks to Tanya for this guest blog post. I would love to see some comments and good discussion about this. I’ll be following up next week with some more thoughts.

[1] http://www.healthdesign.org/chd/research

[2] http://www.hfmmagazine.com/hfmmagazine/html/HFMsurveys.html

[3] http://www.statcan.gc.ca/daily-quotidien/070227/dq070227b-eng.htm

[4] http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/83-237-x/83-237-x2006001-eng.htm

[5] Healing Gardens, Therapeutic Benefits and Design Recommendations, Clare Cooper Marcus, New York Wiley, 1999.

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Posted in Benefits of nature, Landscapes for Health, Research, Seniors | No Comments »

“Outdoor Environments for Children with Autism & Special Needs” in InformeDesign’s ‘Implications’

Wednesday, April 27th, 2011

April Implications 2011 'Outdoor Environments for Children with Autism and Special Needs' by Naomi Sachs and Tara VincentaHot off the press! InformeDesign’s latest issue of Implications (Vol. 9, Issue 1) just went live today, and it features an article by Naomi Sachs and Tara Vincenta, “Outdoor Environments for Children with Autism and Special Needs.” I mentioned this article in my April 13th blog post about Autism Awareness and Landscape Architecture month, but it had not come out yet.

So take a look by linking to the pdf here: http://www.informedesign.org/_news/april_v09-p.pdf.

 

And here is the resource list on autism and related disorders and children and nature mentioned in the article , which will also soon be available for download from the TLN Get Out and Play! page:
PDF of resources on autism and nature-based learning and play for InformeDesign’s ‘Implications’ (Vol. 9, Issue 1)

Tara Vincenta developed the Sequential Outdoor Learning (SOL) Environment and many of the design guidelines in our article are based on SOL Environment principles.

Many thanks to InformeDesign for giving me and Tara this platform to share our work. InformeDesign is an evidence-based design tool that transforms research into an easy-to-read, easy-to-use format for architects, graphic designers, housing specialists, interior designers, landscape architects, and the public. They are, in my humble opinion, one of the best resources out there.

And if you know of people who would benefit from the information in this post, please pass it on!

 

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Posted in Benefits of nature, Children, Children's Gardens, Healing landscapes, Landscapes for Health, Play, Research, Resources | 2 Comments »

Happy Earth Day, Happy Year of the Forests!

Friday, April 22nd, 2011
White oak. Photo by Henry Domke http://www.henrydomke.com

White oak. Photo by Henry Domke, www.henrydomke.com

Wow, under the wire here to get this post out before Earth Day ends. But really, every day is Earth Day, right?

2011 is also the Year of the Tree, or the Year of the Forests, another thing I’ve been meaning to blog about since January.

The International Year of the Tree/Year of the Forests was launched at the United Nations Headquarters in New York to heighten awareness of the value of forests in people’s lives and to galvanize action for trees and forests around the world. Here’s the UN website, with lots of great information, pictures, and videos and here’s their Facebook page. And here’s another nice website/blog, The Tree Year, with all sorts of good information and activities to help you celebrate.

Just one of the many reasons that trees are so awesome: One tree can absorb about a ton of carbon dioxide over its lifetime, and produces nearly 260 pounds of oxygen each year – the equivalent of the amount consumed by 18 people annually. For more fun facts about trees and their importance, see Trees Are Good, by the International Society of Arboriculture.

“Shinrin-yoku,” or “forest bathing,” is a practice in Japan in which people visit a forest while breathing in phytoncides – wood essential oils – that are antimicrobial volatile organic compounds derived from trees. According to Wikipedia (yes, I am cutting corners) it has now become a recognized relaxation and/or stress management activity in Japan.

A great article (“Really? The Claim: Exposure to Plants and Parks Can Boost Immunity,” by Anahad O’Connor for The New York Times, July 5, 2010) about this practice was published last year. I’m hoping the intellectual copyright people won’t sue me for posting two paragraphs from the article here:

“One study published in January included data on 280 healthy people in Japan, where visiting nature parks for therapeutic effect has become a popular practice called “Shinrin-yoku,” or “forest bathing.” On one day, some people were instructed to walk through a forest or wooded area for a few hours, while others walked through a city area. On the second day, they traded places. The scientists found that being among plants produced “lower concentrations of cortisol, lower pulse rate, and lower blood pressure,” among other things.

A number of other studies have shown that visiting parks and forests seems to raise levels of white blood cells, including one in 2007 in which men who took two-hour walks in a forest over two days had a 50-percent spike in levels of natural killer cells. And another found an increase in white blood cells that lasted a week in women exposed to phytoncides in forest air.”

The main study that O’Connor is referring to is:
Li Q, Morimoto K, Kobayashi M, Inagaki H, Katsumata M, Hirata Y, et al. Visiting a forest, but not a city, increases human natural killer activity and expression of anti-cancer proteins. Int J Immunopathol Pharmacol. 2008;21:117–28. Visit that same Wikipedia page for more.

So, happy Earth Day, and happy Year of the Forests!

Posted in Benefits of nature, Healing landscapes, Landscapes for Health, Plants and Horticulture, Research | 2 Comments »

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