Aging and Architecture: from the patient to the citizen

An aging population will be one of the defining societal shifts of the 21st Century, with the number of people aged 60+ expected to double by 2050. Despite this, architectural discourse around aging has been slow to develop and often fails to address emerging debates around diversity and social inequalities in later life. In response, this chapter explores how architectural theory and practice can better respond to the changing needs and aspirations of an increasingly diverse older population, moving away from limited, medicalized understandings of older people’s needs and ageist stereotypes about their preferences. Community-engaged architectural practices are identified as a means of addressing the demands set out by critical gerontologists, who call for citizenship and justice in later life. These are explored in this chapter through a case study in Manchester, UK, which uses the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Age-Friendly Cities model to produce a community action plan that addressed the complex issues facing older people, generating new forms of creative architectural practice derived from meaningful and reciprocal relationships with diverse older communities.