Care put to the test: lived space in residential care during the Covid-19 pandemic

Abstract This article explores architectural space in residential care in Sweden during the Covid-19 pandemic, when residential care was subject to spatial strategies. Community, which is at the heart of the predominant collective care model and underpins the design of architectural space, was identified as a potential source of contagion and thus restricted by spatial measures. Lefebvre’s spatial triad is the theoretical backbone of this study. The research design is an intuitive enquiry and qualitative data collection methods include interviews, observations and analysis of drawings. The lived space of staff and residents is primarily investigated in semi-structured individual interviews, and there is particular focus on their experiences of spatial strategies. Findings show that the collective care model and residents’ everyday lives changed significantly when the virus entered residential care, creating a different lived space. The most common spatial strategies were isolation, social distance and managing movements in line with existing research. These were enacted in existing spatial conditions. The study findings challenge the value of community in the collective care model. For instance, the staff found it very awkward to isolate the residents in their flats, whereas the residents themselves did not view life during the pandemic as very different from normal, everyday life. The findings also challenge the relevance of the architectural models that are in use today. The article concludes that it is necessary to develop new architectural models, a caring architecture in which handling epidemics is less strenuous, and where residents’ diverse wishes can better be met.