Feng Shui: A Qualitative Approach To Healthcare Design

Abstract

This thesis tests the effectiveness of Feng Shui to promote human health and well-being through the application of some of its key precepts to the design of an alternative Community Health Centre on Toronto Island, Toronto, Canada. Feng Shui is a traditional Chinese design methodology that was initially created to address many practical issues of site design. Over centuries it evolved to also address many of the same issues that contemporary design theories like Biophilia and Phenomenology seek to achieve, which is an architecture that is spiritually and emotionally engaging and integrated to its natural environment. This thesis uses the rules of Feng Shui to organize programme, site the buildings in its context, and address decisions related to scale, materiality, orientation, and geometry. Feng Shui, Biophilia, and Phenomenology were researched as background preparation to the design thesis. The evolution of contemporary healthcare design was studied through a series of case studies of seminal hospital projects of the late nineteenth to twentieth century. This thesis tests the effectiveness of Feng Shui to promote human health and well-being through the application of some of its key precepts to the design of an alternative Community Health Centre on Toronto Island, Toronto, Canada. Feng Shui is a traditional Chinese design methodology that was initially created to address many practical issues of site design. Over centuries it evolved to also address many of the same issues that contemporary design theories like Biophilia and Phenomenology seek to achieve, which is an architecture that is spiritually and emotionally engaging and integrated to its natural environment. This thesis uses the rules of Feng Shui to organize programme, site the buildings in its context, and address decisions related to scale, materiality, orientation, and geometry.Feng Shui, Biophilia, and Phenomenology were researched as background preparation to the design thesis. The evolution of contemporary healthcare design was studied through a series of case studies of seminal hospital projects of the late nineteenth to twentieth century. The results and experiences gained from this process are expected to be applicable to other types of buildings