AGED CARE

Roy Hodgson founded Roy Hodgson Design in early 1990, drawing on his established reputation as a leading building designer for seniors living. He is unique in combining design excellence with technical innovation. Right from the beginning, Roy Hodgson Design deliberately steered clear of adopting a style, in favour of approaching the  design of each aged care facility as a unique project, specific to its circumstances, site and requirements. When you work with Roy Hodgson Design, you are working with an interdisciplinary team who value collaboration.

We draw on our years of experience in aged care building design practice and project delivery, and we are committed to understanding your needs.

We believe that innovative design is the result of understanding your goals and aspirations, the building type and budget, and how all of these fit together.

Our building design team bring this knowledge, together with our proven design abilities, enabling us to produce award-winning aged care projects for our clients.

We pride ourselves on winning your respect and maintaining a long term relationship with you as a client.

We have adopted a sustainable approach to our practices, both in the work we do for you and in our own office environment.

When we work on your project, we commit to building an environmentally sensitive, energy-efficient, and sustainable project that is healthy to occupy right from the start – not just as an add-on. We recognise that healthy buildings improve quality of life and increase employee productivity, and we believe sustainable design is also smart design.

Roy Hodgson Design specialises in progressive and innovative design that aims to exceed your expectations and meet all of your goals.

We have cultivated a diverse portfolio of projects in the following practice areas:

• Seniors Living
• Retirement Living
• Independent Living Units
• Residential Aged Care Design

Aged Care – The Design Stage

At Roy Hodgson Design, our residential aged care facility design process revolves around you, our client. We begin by meeting with you on site to walk through exactly what you wish to achieve with your residential aged care facility or seniors living accommodation. We then connect with your key staff so we can understand and appreciate your – or your company’s – philosophy and vision in aged care to ensure our building design concept meets these aspirations .

In developing your aged care facility or seniors living  design concept, we study the surrounding natural and built environment impacting your project, review your previous projects to understand any inherent style you prefer and take you through our extensive database of aged care work, including current trends in residential aged care and seniors living design. We develop an appreciation of your preference for a particular building design style and assist you in defining a wishlist of ideas important to you and the needs of your residents, staff and business.

From this collaboration, at the completion of the design stage is a floor plan design, required elevations, preliminary specifications and a 3D perspective of your project, reflecting your vision, needs and wishlist for your aged care or seniors living development.

Aged Care – The Planning Process

Planning is one of the most important strengths of Roy Hodgson Design. With more than 20 years of master planning experience in multiple Council jurisdictions and various states, we apply this wealth of knowledge to your project. Every project has its own unique set of challenges required local planning scheme and zoning research. It is the practiced eye at Roy Hodgson Design that will help you steer through the complex laws and codes and achieve the right outcome for you.

Depending on your project, the various skills we can apply to it include:

• design of large area master plans and site plans for new developments.
• assessment of present land use regulations for given areas to make a recommendation on how those regulations could be addressed to arrive at the most appropriate development.
• application of fundamental site design and urban design principles, as well as interpreting complex code regulations, smoothing the course through the jurisdictional review process. We develop project outcomes to reflect your needs and good site design principles, while also complying with government regulations.
• Engagement with the local community, which assists in open discourse local residents and their better understanding and appreciation of the project, resulting in fewer objections from local community members and a smooth passage through the town planning approval process.

Aged Care – Construction Documentation

The Working Drawings stage of the project process is the final preparation of design documentation before your project can be submitted for a building permit and pricing from a builder. We develop this full set of drawings and specifications to ensure that the final building accurately reflects the initial design intent as per your original requirements and any changes that you may request.

When we prepare your documentation, we go through a number of steps:

• Consultation with authorities, during which we prepare material for consultation with relevant local, regional, state and federal authorities, compliance with the Certification Assessment Instrument and Guidelines, dealing with laws, statute, building codes and regulations affecting the project.
• Architectural documentation, our preparation of documents based on approved design development standards, detailing the architectural construction requirements of the project. This includes the Working Drawings, the approved design development documents for tendering and construction, including details necessary for the builder to accurately assess the cost, extent and content of the works.
• Coordination of any secondary consultants needed for your project, such as for specialised and detailed drawing work. Interior design, the space planning, partition and furniture layouts, material and colour selections for the interior of your project.
• Liaison with a cost consultant for bills of quantities, a specified bill or other methods of analysing the quantities of the materials in the project where applicable.
• Submission of completed and approved documents for a Building Approval.

Contract Administration

When you rely on Roy Hodgson Design for your aged care project contract administration, you can expect us to look after you and your building project. Together we will establish the scope of the works to be completed, using the working drawings and specifications we have completed  during the construction documentation stage of your aged care building project.

When we are both comfortable that we understand the end result you require, we begin putting together the project estimation and budget. The estimation is a detailed list of each and every cost that will be associated with your project. The estimates will be confirmed by the selected construction companies quotes, when these are tendered. A fixed price will be locked in with the selected construction company and the appropriate construction contract developed for your specific project.

Throughout the project, we keep a running track of the costs against your project’s budget, accounting for any variations that may occur during construction.

Before construction is commenced we create a schedule, making sure that each stage of the project has been adequately planned. We liaise closely with the selected contractor to ensure the construction is kept on-track and to ensure your project is completed in the time we have set out in the contract. This schedule also dictates any draw downs required from your lending institution, as well as payments to the contractors.

During the construction process, we manage all builders RFI’s and progress claims. If there is a need to make variations to your original plans and specifications, either because you decide to make a change or because the particular site or materials supplied require it, we use our thorough contract control system to document every agreed variation and ensure that anything else affected by the change, such as the schedule or budget, is updated as well. In this way, we make sure that you know, and we know, what is expected at all times.