Stunning colours and luxury finishing touches at Benson House
When you step inside Benson House, in Benson near Wallingford, you will see that the design, the colours and the luxury finishing touches have all been put together with our residents’ comfort and safety in mind.
At Benson House the furniture, fixtures and fittings are similar to a prestigious hotel. A huge amount of thought and planning goes into the décor and the finishing touches which all make the most of the design features of the building and help to capture the natural light. The naming of some of our communal areas such as dining rooms and lounges have been influenced by the RAF Benson base which is located close to the home. The base is a big part of the local community and houses a range of helicopters including Puma’s and Chinook’s, which may be recognisable when the home opens.
There’s luxury Tarkett brushed pine grey flooring in the Benson Dining Room and aqua tones in the Lounge. Beautiful floral patterns in some of the bedrooms are echoed in the runners and cushions. If you take a look at the mood boards (below) put together by our interior design team, with their experience in optimum design for older people, you can get a real feel for the quality and contrasts you will find throughout the rooms at Benson House.
When considering colours for a care home it’s interesting to note that our perception of colour is governed by a combination of three factors – hue, saturation and tone. As the eye ages it loses some capacity to interpret some of these factors and we have to manage the materials we use to ensure our environments are easily understood by people living with older eyes or other visual impairment.
Hue is what we generally understand to be colour. The mix of red, green and blue that creates the dominant ‘colour’ of an object or surface. Saturation governs the depth and intensity of a colour. A bright green would have a high saturation factor, whereas a washed out grey/green would have a low saturation value. Tone governs the amount of light a colour reflects - what we perceive to be a light or dark colour. Tone is what creates contrast.
There is science behind the interior design of our homes and a lot of research has been done into finding the best for our residents, both by Caring Homes and more widely within in the sector. Our colours, patterns and finishes are carefully selected along with artwork and destination pieces to position at the end of a corridor or on a landing.
Both colours and contrast are especially important for those living with dementia as is lighting, directional signage and finishes – for example to highlight where a door is, to see what is inside a drawer or a cupboard or to easily find the bathroom.
As with all things in life people will all have their own individual preferences so the many lounges and quiet corners in Benson House are decorated differently and there is sure to be one which will be a favourite to each individual and may become their preferred place for a cup of coffee and a chat with visitors, or a special seat to sit and read a book by the window.
Personal items are encouraged in residents’ bedrooms to help them to settle into their new home and rooms also have memory boxes which can be used to display special personal items and help to signpost an individual’s room for them. As well as being opulent in surroundings Benson House offers comfort and a warm welcome, truly a home from home.
