Translating Evidence-Based Design Requirements into Age-Friendly Therapeutic Landscapes Through Aromatic Plants

The application of aromatic plants in nursing-home environments has traditionally been approached from a plant-centered perspective, emphasizing species characteristics, horticultural performance, or therapeutic effects. However, how aromatic plants can function as integrated landscape design elements to address older adults’ environmental needs remains insufficiently explored. This study addresses this gap by establishing an evidence-based design translation framework for age-friendly therapeutic landscapes in nursing homes. An integrated AHP–QFD–TRIZ approach was developed to transform older adults’ needs into landscape design attributes and spatial strategies. AHP prioritized the evidence-derived user requirements, QFD translated these requirements into design-oriented attributes, and TRIZ supported the resolution of conflicts among competing design objectives. The results identify safety as the highest-ranked need, which was subsequently treated as an admission condition in the proposed design framework, whereas fragrance characteristics, spatial configuration, planting density, and horticultural engagement represent key optimization dimensions. By shifting the focus from selecting suitable aromatic plants toward translating user requirements into coordinated landscape interventions, this study advances the role of aromatic plants from isolated planting materials to functional components within age-friendly therapeutic environments. The proposed approach provides a methodological basis for developing safe, sustainable, and health-supportive nursing-home landscapes.