Apartment Design at The Summit in Hockessin, DE
Next to the lakes and woods of Delaware's Hockessin is an excellent space in which to start your retirement journey. However, many senior communities of the past have been somewhat "one size fits all," preventing people from enjoying a high-quality experience.
Here at The Summit, however, we have kept apprised of the latest news in apartment design for spaces like these, aiming to ensure that we offer senior-friendly layouts. However, what does this mean?
Continue reading to learn how we have incorporated aging-in-place design into our assisted living apartments, providing our residents with more accessible living features than ever before. Discover how this extends to our memory care floor plans, ensuring that we offer something for everyone, regardless of the living options they choose within our community.
Apartment Design for Every Level of Care
We are aware of some of the negative stereotypes of those in senior care and have made every effort to ensure that what we offer falls as far outside of them as possible. With ample square footage in each of our suites, we have ensured that people have plenty of room to move around, allowing them to do so not only on foot but also when using accessibility aids or wheelchairs. These provide people with an unprecedented level of independence, regardless of how easily they can move around.
Similarly, our open and spacious indoor spaces allow us to utilize a significant amount of natural light. By spreading out the furnishings, we ensure that every home has a good level of ambient light, regardless of its size. Each of our suites features a large window that allows plenty of natural light during the day, helping residents maintain their natural sleep cycle and mental health.
Supporting Aging-in-Place Through Design
As seniors make up almost one-quarter of the world's population, a wealth of research and expertise is available to help us ensure that our indoor spaces have everything they need to support an independent and contented population of older adults.
For example, instead of having separate kitchen areas, our open kitchen-living room design reduces the number of pinch points when moving around the space.
For those in Memory Care, the lack of a doorway also helps them to understand the reason for moving from one space to another, reducing the amount of wandering and allowing everyone in the home to always be in sight lines if necessary. Similarly, it ensures that those who may have trouble with their digestion can always see the bathroom, helping them to get there even if they are prone to forgetting.
Easy to Handle Utilities
On all our doors, we install lever handles that can be operated with a light touch. Our residents are thus able to move around their own spaces or even leave for the larger community without worrying about their muscle strength. Those with arthritis, for example, can easily interact with the full range of amenities and require less support to go about their regular, daily routine.
Our faucets are similarly single-lever, allowing our residents to interact with them without difficulty. They also don't need to remember where the lever needs to be in terms of hot or cold, so that they can leave it in a preferred position. They only need to raise or lower it to ensure that they get the temperature that best suits their body.
Enacting Key Safety Standards
To protect our residents, we leverage various ways to keep them safe, even in the event of an accident. For example, our sinks and showers cannot heat water to a temperature that is likely to cause damage. Avoiding scalding temperatures prevents sleeping or fallen residents from accidentally coming to harm. Instead, it allows them the peace of mind that comes with knowing they can interact with their suite without such fears.
We also ensure that all our thresholds do not use steps or steep ramps, thereby removing the difficulties of getting in and out of spaces. Even our showers offer roll-in design, so that those in wheelchairs can enter and exit with minimum hassle. Should you or a loved one need additional help, they will be able to find shower chairs available for use when they have trouble standing for too long.
Within our showers, we also install grip bars to help with standing and making careful movements around the space during daily routines. Should it be necessary, our suites do have emergency call buttons, however. These offer both simple buttons and pull cords that allow users to interact with them, whether they are upright or not.
Varied Residences for Different Needs
Should you not require additional help with your day, our Independent Senior Living suites give you all the freedom you need, including the ability to host guests more easily, with a full kitchen and various other amenities.
For those who require additional support, our Senior Assisted Living spaces offer a smaller space with combined living and sleeping areas, making the transition between these spaces that much easier. The bathroom in these areas backs onto the living and sleeping space, helping to reduce the number of steps necessary when one needs the room.
The kitchen is also smaller in these suites, allowing guests to use it for preparing smaller meals or snacks. However, we do provide a full Sensations dining room, staffed by trained chefs who can provide for the full nutritional needs of our residents, while those in our care can relax with a meal that meets their preferences.
Have Confidence in Your Future at The Summit
We combine high-class apartment design with the comfort and safety needs of our residents to ensure they have everything they need every day of their lives.
Everything we use, from grab bars to the positioning of each door, supports long-term independence where possible, as well as the dignity of those staying with us.
To learn more about how we encourage each of these tenets, please get in touch. Book a tour of our community and discover how we can help you or a loved one today.