27 Jun 2017

How a health revolution started with a window

From Nights, 7:12 pm on 27 June 2017

Hospital architecture - a triumph of function over form. Lots of rooms - lots of walls - not very many windows - not many rooms with views. Less than a century ago - it was the opposite - people designed hospitals with big rooms and big windows, because they were thought to be healthier. Then in the 1940s, the US architect, Charles Neergaard, began to lead a change towards greater efficiency of space - the modern functional, but some would say, soulless hospital, was born. Jeanne Kisascky is an architectural historian, who's been studying and writing about Neergaard and the modern hospital.