DrawnOut! Design Advocacy for Mental Health

Stephen Parker, AIA M.Arch NCARB LEED AP BD+C is a Behavioral + Mental Health Planner at Stantec in Washington, DC. He currently serves as a global ULI Health Leader, an Associate Director for the Design Mental Health Network of the United Kingdom, a member of the Center for Health Design’s Behavioral & Mental Health Environment Network, Design Chair for the DC Building Industry Association, a US Representative to the UIA Public Health Group, and a former YAF National Advocacy Director. The youngest licensed architect elected to the AIA Strategic Council, he served as Co-Convener of the AIA’s Mental Health + Architecture Incubator. Stephen is an AIA Young Architect Award recipient, an ENR National 20 Under 40 Top Young Professional, a Healthcare Design Magazine Rising Star, a DCBIA Young Leader Achievement Award winner and a recipient of the George Pressler Under 40 Award from the Healthcare Facilities Symposium.

One degree of separation can be all that divides us from close friends and family in crisis. With a parent admitted to a behavioral health facility, it is a subject close to home. My namesake is a family member who lost his life to addiction. My godfather is a veteran. My graduate thesis in wounded warrior polytrauma care was informed by invisible wounds of war experienced by my friends serving abroad. Their stories of traumatic brain injuries & post-traumatic stress syndrome (PTSD) gave purpose to my design research.

It is through this lens that much of my practice is defined, a practice of purpose and advocacy defined by design.

Mental wellbeing and health have been rising in public awareness, catalyzed by the pandemic. When socially isolated, our built environment can have an even more profound impact upon our mental health. This has led to a surge in demand for mental health services, and unfortunately the limited number of psychiatric inpatient facilities, outpatient clinics and crisis stabilization centers are often overwhelmed. This is also an opportunity to learn more deeply about this growing field of practice and craft an inspired, collective response.

While the modern dilemma that plagues the globe continues to be access to mental health care, we can generate agency and overcome stigma. We are all grappling with the consequences of COVID economically, physically, and especially mentally. We must, as a profession, come together as a collective of knowledge and expertise, to address this critical issue. Only through ideation and design integration in collaboration with top industry health professions can we accomplish a sustainable solution.

Spurred by the success of the AIA Strategic Council’s Mental Health + Architecture Incubator, the thirst for, not just the knowledge around mental health design, but, the creation of a space to discuss the topic openly and candidly. Few instances allow professionals or the general public to discuss the psychiatric needs of our clients, colleagues and communities - as well as ourselves. The built environment has a profound impact on one’s mental health and equipping architects with this necessary knowledge can lead to a profound impact on their designs. To answer this need for a space to discuss mental health and the profession, our Mental Health Sketching Workshop was born, with the first iteration at ArchxE in 2022 and refined into

DrawnOut! at A’23. DrawnOut! was an effort headed by myself, Emily Schickner and Shahad Sadeq that looked at ideation and sketching solutions for mental health environments.

With the interactive workshop, DrawnOut! helps participants learn first-hand from a panel of internationally-recognized behavioral health planners regarding sensory-sensitive approaches to mental health design. Jon Sell & myself are mental health design subject matter experts and co-lead the boundaryless Behavioral Health Practice at Stantec. Combined, they have designed millions of square feet of mental health facilities, thousands of patient beds of all facility types and patient populations.

Sadeq is the executive director for AIA Springfield and fellow designer previously admitted to an inpatient psychiatric facility for a condition all too common in our profession - burnout. Espinosa, a licensed psychotherapist adding a clinical perspective to the discussion and evolving the conversation further for participants during the largest gathering of architects in the world during A’23 in San Francisco.

Schickner, Principal of Harrison Design in Atlanta, Georgia moderates the frank conversation amongst panelists. Given Sadeq’s unique experience as a lens, the expertise of the behavioral health planners & the clinical perspective to understanding the impact of the built environment on mental wellbeing and the design strategies for all architects to consider in their practice, regardless of typology, were crucial takeaways.

A design primer sets the stage for the audience to roll up their sleeves, team up and sketch ideas for space in a mental health facility - the visitation suite.This is typically the only space that the outside world - families, friends, loved ones - can experience mental health facilities without being staff or patients. The multi-hour workshop gathers participants in teams to rapidly explore the persona of visiting family member or friend to a mental health facility, ideate new insights, inspire us through empathy, and design with dignity.

In this unique collaborative experience we engage with each other’s expertise through brainstorming, prototyping and design integration. This ensures innovative and seamless ideation that stems from collective practice and knowledge. We are greater than the sum of our parts and our collaborative experience is a testament to the power of design.

The sketches are gathered and on display as a living mural online via various channels and will be added to as an ongoing installation for AIA chapters to leverage with contributions throughout conferences and beyond. The hashtag #MentalHealthSketch will leverage a wider audience engagement outside of the venue.

Besides A’23 in San Francisco, we’ll be bringing our unique, engaging Drawn Out workshop to the AIA Aspire Conference in Asheville, NC later in 2023, among other events. In this way, we’ll continue to democratize design strategies for mental health, address stigma and provide an avenue for every designer to advocate through design. The workshop is intended to be the start of a series of events to make this material accessible and provide agency to all stakeholders involved in the design process. Together we’ll advocate for mental health through the power of design.