Park of the CARISMA care home: a healing garden

For some years the Fondazione Casa di Ricovero S. Maria Ausiliatrice in Bergamo has been extending and renewing its facilities: new, modern, cutting-edge buildings have been built on its land, together with the ambitious plan to complete them with a large park, equipped and suited to the needs of the patients who use it. The practice set out to match the quality of the architectural choices, respecting and complementing them. The particular needs of a place such as a care home must be reflected in its buildings as well as its grounds. The design of the park grows around the ideas of usability and easy access for the residents and their visitors: wide, winding footpaths run through the park among tall trees, which provide the right amount of shade, and shrubs, which create patches of colour and scent as the seasons change.