Housing for Artful Ageing: Reconceptualising Housing for Older Adults Through the Care Ecology of Everyday Life

Abstract

This article develops the concept of Housing for Artful Ageing by integrating theoretical perspectives from Artful Ageing philosophy with empirical insights from an anthropological study of housing for older adults in Copenhagen. Drawing on Jon Dag Rasmussen’s concept of ‘the housing area for older adults’ particular (care) ecology’, we argue that successful housing for older adults requires attention to both spatial (physical–material) and spacious (inclusive–experiential) dimensions of ageing lives. Through detailed analysis of everyday life in Guldbergs Have, a housing area for older adults in Copenhagen, we demonstrate how micro-interactions, sensory experiences, and minor gestures create an ecological whole that supports wellbeing beyond biomedical paradigms of successful ageing. Synthesising Manning’s theory of minor gestures with Basting’s creative care approach, we show how Artful Ageing transforms ageing from a narrative of decline into a dynamic process of becoming. We propose design principles and policy implications for creating housing that enables artful processes of becoming in later life, challenging the pathologising tendencies of active ageing discourse through attention to the small ageing experiences that constitute meaningful everyday existence.

1. Introduction: Architectures of Ageing in Place

As the United Nations notes, ‘ageing is a human success story, a reason to celebrate the triumph of public health, medical advancements, and economic and social development over diseases, injuries and early deaths that have limited human life spans throughout history’ [1]. By 2050, one in six people globally will be over 65, up from one in 11 in 2019 [1]. This demographic transition demands innovations in public policy matched by sympathetic design of cities and building of communities [2].

Contemporary approaches to housing for older adults are dominated by what we term ‘the accommodation paradigm’—an understanding that reduces housing to a functional problem of accessibility, safety, and medical proximity. This paradigm, whilst addressing important practical concerns, fails to recognise housing as a dynamic socio-material assemblage that profoundly shapes possibilities for meaningful existence in later life. As Fristrup and Rasmussen argue, dominant narratives of successful and active ageing frame biomedical interventions in ageing societies, positioning older adults as problems to be managed rather than as individuals engaged in ongoing creative processes of becoming [3]. Concepts of successful and healthy ageing popular in the twentieth century are now considered insufficient to support the reality of an extended lifespan. These are being replaced by a resilience-based model proposed by Cosco et al., which argues that as one ages, one may encounter increasing levels of adversity, yet ‘wellbeing is an integral component of adding life to years in the presence of increasing longevity’ [4]. Supporting the objective of wellbeing through the course of one’s life, ‘ageing in place’ (AIP) emerges as an important contemporary approach—now a ‘policy goal for many governments and a personal goal for numerous older people’ [5].

This article proposes Housing for Artful Ageing as an alternative conceptual framework that builds on and extends existing work on resilience-based approaches to ageing, spatial gerontology, and creative care—one that honours what Erin Manning terms ‘minor gestures’ [6] and creates conditions for what we conceptualise as ‘små aldringserfaringer’ (small ageing experiences) [7]. Whilst Cosco et al.’s resilience-based model importantly argues that wellbeing remains integral to ageing even in the presence of adversity [4], Housing for Artful Ageing extends this by attending to the spatial–material and ecological conditions through which such resilient wellbeing is constituted—a dimension that existing frameworks, including those oriented towards resilience and active ageing, leave underspecified. Recent work has demonstrated how Artful Ageing fundamentally reconfigures our understanding of the ageing experience, transforming it from a narrative of decline into a dynamic process of becoming, in which physical and existential spaces intertwine to create opportunities for emancipatory experiences [8]. We develop this framework through detailed engagement with an anthropological study of Guldbergs Have, a housing area for older adults in Copenhagen, conducted by Jon Dag Rasmussen [9]. His ethnographic work reveals what he terms ‘ældreboligområdets særlige (omsorgs)økologi’—the housing area for older adults’ particular (care) ecology—a concept we argue exemplifies and extends Artful Ageing philosophy into spatial practice.

2. Theoretical Framework

2.1. Beyond Successful Ageing: The Pathologisation Problem

The paradigms of ‘successful ageing’ and ‘active ageing’ have inadvertently created systems of surveillance and normalisation. Rowe and Kahn’s influential framework creates binary distinctions between ‘successful’ and ‘unsuccessful’ ageing, effectively pathologising those who cannot or choose not to conform to prescribed ideals of health, activity, and productivity [3,10,11]. This pathologisation operates spatially through what we might call architectures of containment—institutional environments that prioritise functional efficiency over human agency and creative engagement. The biomedicalisation of ageing positions older adults as biological citizens [12] who must manage their ageing through constant self-surveillance and adherence to expert recommendations. This ‘will to health in later life’ [13] transforms all activities into instruments for health maintenance, creating environments where spontaneity, pleasure, and non-instrumental experiences become marginalised or suspect. As Gilroy argues, the image of the active third ager makes certain assumptions about familial and financial means, creating ‘new forms of inequality’ and potentially discriminating against people who are ‘vulnerable, fragile, and dependent’ [14,15].

Artful Ageing takes a critical stance towards the normative foundations and biopolitical agendas embedded in current regimes of active ageing and longevity [8]. It represents an ambition to enable and support artful lives, events, and activities amongst residents, where the focus is on the process instead of the product when focusing on activities and events in concrete settings [8]. This represents a fundamental reorientation from the ‘major efforts of active ageing’ towards ‘minor gestures of ageing’ [8], emphasising opportunities to explore the manifold ephemeral, non-rational, and in-between elements of an ageing life.

2.2. Artful Ageing: Core Principles and Transformative Dimensions

Artful Ageing emerges from the intersection of several critical theoretical streams. Drawing on Rosi Braidotti’s posthumanist distinction between bios (discursive, political life) and zoe (vitalistic, generative life) [16], we argue for approaches that honour ‘the non-rational and in-between elements of ageing lives’ [7]. This requires what Manning calls ‘autistic perception’—an openness before categorisation that allows for genuine encounters with difference [6].

The transformative potential of Artful Ageing lies in its fundamental reconfiguration of our understanding of the ageing experience. The framework transforms ageing from a narrative of decline into a dynamic process of becoming, where physical and existential spaces intertwine to create opportunities for emancipatory experiences [8]. This transformative power emerges through what Manning terms ‘art-as-practice’ [6] and what Basting describes as ‘moments of awe’ [17]—small, ephemeral encounters that carry profound potential for connection and meaning-making. Central to Artful Ageing is Manning’s concept of ‘minor gestures’—small transformative movements that resist categorisation and create possibilities for alternative ways of being [6]. These gestures are not grand interventions but subtle shifts in attention, small moments of connection, fleeting experiences of pleasure or recognition. In spatial contexts, minor gestures might include residents personalising standardised spaces, creating impromptu social interactions in common areas, or adapting architectural features for creative use.

Particularly significant is how this framework reconceptualises the relationship between space, creativity, and ageing experience. Rather than viewing ageing spaces (such as care facilities) as merely functional environments, they become what the Artful Ageing perspective describes as ‘emancipatory spaces’—environments that support planned creative activities and spontaneous, meaningful moments [8]. When initiatives are aimed at maintaining adequate measures of openness, ambiguity, and sensory intimacy, they allow for the experience of metaphorical cracks and afford artful pockets in which to reside for a while, seek refuge, recharge, stray from the beaten track, and obtain an always partial feeling of emancipation [3,8].

2.3. Designing for Wellbeing

In order to support AIP, designing for a high quality of life is essential. Quality of life is defined as a ‘multidimensional construct, containing domains of physical health, psychological well-being, social relationships, and the physical environment’ [18,19]. Barnes et al. note that, in this context, design should meet the requirements of the physically frail while also being cognisant of the needs of people with cognitive impairments [20]. Design must facilitate ease of wayfinding, provide multi-sensory stimuli to induce happiness, and allow for privacy and articulation of ‘defensible space’ to foster a sense of control and ownership [20]. Recent research by Freja Ståhlberg-Aalto highlights that whilst aesthetics are important to health and wellbeing, the concept of aesthetics is ‘multifaceted and ambiguous’ [21]. She proposes an approach to aesthetics and architecture of the care environment that goes beyond the primacy of vision, locating it at the intersection of aesthetics (‘sensory qualities, contextual features, the social dimension, and function’) and architectural features (‘stuff, surfaces, space and light, and the surroundings’) [21].

2.4. Ageing in Place: Definitions and Critiques

AIP is commonly understood as the ‘desire of older people to live in their own housing and communities as long as possible’ [22]. However, this perspective operates under inaccurate assumptions that all older people will have access to stable and appropriate housing through home ownership. Forsyth and Molinsky identify seven definitions of the concept: (1) never moving; (2) staying put for as long as possible; (3) staying in the same vicinity; (4) staying out of a nursing home; (5) not needing to move to get higher levels of service; (6) having choices; and (7) as a multifaceted policy ideal [5]. Pani-Harreman et al. further identify the ‘place’ in AIP as ‘physical place’ and ‘attachment to place’, arguing that AIP ‘includes not only staying in one’s own home, but also includes remaining in a stable and known environment where people feel that they belong’ [23].

The AIP paradigm is nuanced and complex. Hillcoat-Nallétamby and Ogg argue that there is a ‘tendency for the home context to be over-romanticised as the ideal living environment for fostering independence’, ignoring its potential as a place which can create feelings of ‘social isolation’, ‘alienation’, and ‘disempowerment’, especially if it ‘becomes the site for intensive medical treatment and service intervention’ [24]. Rogers et al. propose the terms ‘ageing in the community’ and ‘ageing in the right place’, defining AIP as ‘one’s journey to maintain independence in one’s place of residence as well as to participate in one’s community’ [25]. This suggests that focus should be on the ‘individual’s agency’ to choose from residential options available to maintain one’s autonomy [25].

2.5. Integrated Communities and High-Rise Living

Integrated living is one manifestation of the ageing-in-place approach. Schittich argues that it is not just about how to care for older people, but also about how these provisions might encourage their ‘integration into society’ and allow them to ‘continue to lead highly self-determined lives’ [26]. Integrated living means ‘different groups of the population living together under one roof, and, as such, different residential forms in the same building’ [26]. The goal is mutual enrichment and support. Ebner warns against idealising this idea, advocating instead a ‘dynamic model’ that addresses different forms of living to varying degrees, centred on the principle of ‘taking a stand against social exclusion’ [27].

High-rise living for older adults has emerged as a model across different contexts. The Apartments for Life model, developed in the Netherlands in the 1990s, intended that people aged 55-plus be eligible to move into Apartments for Life, and that they typically enter whilst still independent. If individuals eventually require assisted living or nursing home-level care, care is brought to them; they do not move [28]. The tendency to ‘exchange owner-occupied housing for more comfortable housing in rental or tenant co-operative housing’ is also on the rise in Sweden [29], whilst evaluation of high-rise, high-density apartments in Singapore reveals that they are ‘age-friendly in terms of the proximity of amenities and services, good walking facilities and public transportation system, and the presence of people and opportunities for social participation’ [30].

2.6. Intergenerational Practice and Active Citizenship

The notion of intergenerational learning was first introduced by Margaret Mead in the 1970s, and it has since become a global concern due to the widening generational gap. Buffel et al. identify the reasons as ‘demographic transitions, economic restructuring, shifting social norms, and improved technological innovation’ [31]. Manchester and Facer note how the divide between generations has manifested spatially in age-segregated planning and design of our cities [32]. Intergenerational practice is a set of activities and initiatives that attempt to provide opportunities for purposeful and meaningful encounters between people of different generations [33], with a spatial aspect termed ‘intergenerational contact zones’ (ICZs) [34].

Continuing the critique of narratives around successful and healthy ageing, this article also examines older adults’ rights to the city and active citizenship as extensions of wellbeing. According to del Barrio et al., there are ‘generations of older people [who] demand a space where they can develop and contribute to society, regardless of their age’ [15]. However, the notion of active ageing that emerged in the 1990s creates assumptions that might unwittingly discriminate against people who are ‘vulnerable, fragile, and dependent’ [15]. The notion of active (social) citizenship is more inclusive. Menezes et al. define active citizenship as concerned with the right to the city and social justice, which gives older people the opportunity to engage with and participate in the city and the opportunities it offers [35]. As Brannelly discusses, it is a ‘multifaceted and contested’ [36] concept concerning ‘rights and responsibilities’ [36], which informs the relationship of people with larger structures of rule and belonging, according to Bartlett [37].

2.7. The Care Ecology of Housing Areas for Older Adults

Rasmussen’s concept of ‘the housing area for older adults’ particular (care) ecology’ provides a crucial bridge between Artful Ageing theory and spatial practice. The concept describes how security and safety amongst residents result from both formal measures and informal, everyday interactions [9]. As Rasmussen explains, ‘many small and seemingly insignificant social interactions help underpin the security and safety residents describe’ [9]. Collectively, these encounters lead to an experience of being surrounded and enveloped by others, of being enveloped in care.

Drawing on Timothy Morton’s understanding that ecological phenomena consist of wholes composed of interacting parts that are not particularly noteworthy in themselves but become significant through their interdependence [38], Rasmussen argues that the totality of small interactions in Guldbergs Have has this ‘ecological character’, where many exchanges, conversations, smiles, gestures, greetings—many micro-encounters with both informal and formal care persons—together create an interface and whole [9]. The care ecology cannot be observed in isolation; individual aspects do not constitute an ecology. Rather, they must be understood as parts of a whole consisting of many small and interdependent care elements that together lead to an experience of being surrounded by others [9].

The care ecology comprises both formal and informal elements. Formal elements include social housing officers, health and care professionals, property office staff, and service personnel. Informal elements include interactions with local shopkeepers, delivery personnel, minibuses and other vehicles in motion, service employees in outdoor areas, and neighbourly relations. The power of the care ecology lies in its cumulative effects—individual micro-interactions might seem insignificant, but collectively, they create what residents experience as a profound sense of security, connection, and care.

3. Methodological Approach: Conceptual Development Through Secondary Analysis of Ethnographic Data

This article employs a conceptual–ethnographic methodology that builds upon previously published ethnographic fieldwork to develop a novel theoretical framework. The research approach can be characterised as follows: This study undertakes a theoretically driven reanalysis of extensive ethnographic fieldwork previously conducted and published by Jon Dag Rasmussen [9]. The original ethnographic study, documented in Rasmussen’s research report, comprises fieldwork conducted between November 2023 and January 2024, involving qualitative interviews with 16 residents of Guldbergs Have plus the associated social housing officer. Interviews ranged from 26 min to 1 h 29 min [9]. The original study set out to explore how residents of Guldbergs Have experience everyday life in and around housing for older adults, examining what makes housing meaningful beyond functional accessibility, how residents negotiate relationships with neighbours and the surrounding local area, and how formal and informal care structures contribute to wellbeing and security. Key findings included residents overwhelmingly describing their housing as ‘everything’, the identification of a distinctive care ecology comprising multiple micro-interactions that create pervasive security, and the centrality of housing as both physical space and existential anchor [9]. Drawing on this empirical foundation, we engage in what Tavory and Timmermans [39] term ‘abductive analysis’—moving iteratively between existing ethnographic insights and emerging theoretical concepts to generate the framework of Housing for Artful Ageing. The abductive process involved systematic re-reading of Rasmussen’s field notes and interview transcripts through successive theoretical lenses, identifying patterns invisible within the original analytical framework and formulating conceptual propositions to be tested against the empirical material. A concrete example of this abductive movement: when multiple residents independently described their housing as meaning ‘everything’, iterative engagement between this empirical convergence and Manning’s concept of minor gestures revealed that such expressions of absolute significance emerge not from grand architectural features but from accumulated micro-interactions, care encounters, and sensory experiences—an insight that is irreducible to either the original ethnographic framework or Artful Ageing theory considered in isolation. This approach enables us to revisit familiar empirical material with fresh analytical questions, rendering previously implicit patterns and practices visible through a new conceptual lens. The methodology rests on the premise that knowledge gained is deep and nuanced but limited in breadth, based on a small number of respondents. Respondents are people with their own views and perspectives—what research terminology calls a ‘lifeworld perspective’—and the goal is to explore their subjective experiences.

As Jon Dag Rasmussen was the principal researcher in the original fieldwork, this study benefits from deep, embodied knowledge of the research settings and participants. We acknowledge that this insider perspective shapes our theoretical development, whilst the temporal distance from the original fieldwork and engagement with subsequent scholarly debates enables fresh interpretive possibilities. Reflexivity and researcher positionality deserve explicit attention. The primary empirical author’s intimate knowledge of Guldbergs Have creates both analytical advantages and potential blind spots: familiarity with research settings enables recognition of subtle patterns that might escape an outsider, whilst also risking confirmation bias in the reanalysis. To address this, we adopted a dialogic approach in which the first author, whose primary expertise lies in Artful Ageing theory rather than in the original fieldwork, consistently questioned analytical decisions and challenged interpretive moves that might reflect familiarity rather than genuine theoretical insight. The credibility of our analysis rests on the consistency of patterns across multiple independent respondents, the coherence of empirical findings with theoretical concepts developed from entirely separate intellectual traditions, and the verifiability of specific empirical claims through Rasmussen’s publicly available research report [9]. The ethnographic approach proves essential for documenting what Stončikaitė terms ‘usually unvoiced and difficult-to-solve aspects’ of ageing experience [40]. Ethnography’s capacity to examine ‘personal experiences, everyday occurrences in the most mundane settings, and conversations that are difficult to document through more traditional research methods’ [40] makes it particularly suited to documenting the minor gestures through which residents negotiate creative agency within architectural constraints. This methodological approach aligns with Artful Ageing’s emphasis on process-oriented engagement, attending to the small moments of possibility that Manning describes and creating opportunities for the moments of awe that Basting emphasises [8]. The scope of transferability requires explicit reflection. The analysis is grounded in a single housing context within Copenhagen’s specific welfare-state arrangements, cultural norms of neighbourliness, and Danish housing-policy frameworks. Whilst the depth of ethnographic insight is a strength, the framework’s applicability to other cultural, institutional, and social contexts requires careful ‘translation work’—accounting for differences in welfare provision, housing tenure, intergenerational norms, and urban geography. We contend, however, that the underlying principles of the care ecology—micro-interactions creating cumulative security, housing as an existential anchor, and permeability between dwelling and neighbourhood—address existential dimensions of the ageing experience that transcend specific local contexts, offering conceptual resources applicable across diverse settings, where their specific expressions will necessarily vary.

The study also exemplifies what might be termed a ‘bricolage’ approach to research—a form of making-do and cobbling together to create an argument in a ‘context of resource constraints’ [41]. The process is creative, messy, and iterative, in its purposeful deployment of approaches like interviews, narrative analysis, and ethnography [42]. In the context of health research, bricolage can help navigate ‘unstable reality’ and the ‘various facets/dimensions involved in health services and systems’, acknowledging the ‘heterogeneity of fragmented knowledge’ [42]. This approach resonates with Todd Levon Brown’s notion of ‘social performance’, which Brown argues is especially important in the case of socially responsible architecture [43]. Modern post-occupancy evaluation (POE) has been used in institutional settings to ascertain technical issues, but Brown argues that POE remains fundamentally technocratic and serious considerations need to be given to asking important ‘socially and psychologically critical questions’ [43]. Questions almost always left out include ‘image of the building, self-image as reflective in the building, perceptions of socio-spatial marginalisation, psychosocial perceptions of building users and occupants, emotive qualities of architectural spaces, the supportive and restorative nature of the building, and how the building is perceived as welcoming or uninviting’ [43].

4. Empirical Findings: Housing for Artful Ageing in Practice

4.1. ‘It Means Everything’: The Significance of Housing

When asked what their housing means to them, residents of Guldbergs Have consistently expressed profound significance. Six of the 16 interviewed residents explicitly state that housing means ‘everything’, emphasising this importance through their language and formulations [9]. A 69-year-old man responds: ‘It means everything’ [9]. He elaborates that he moved from another street in the neighbourhood where he had lived for 45 years, describing it as important to remain on Nørrebro and that the flats’ maintained condition mattered for his desire to move. An 86-year-old woman answers similarly: ‘It means everything. I lived on [street name] and used to go over for bingo here in the area… next year it’ll be 20 years since I joined the bingo association… So I knew, more or less, people over here, right? So there’s been no melancholy about moving here. Quite the contrary’ [9]. When she saw the flat for the first time, she told her daughter and son-in-law ‘that one, I want that one’. ‘Are you sure, Mum?’ her daughter said. ‘One hundred per cent’, she replied [9].

These expressions of absolute significance invite deeper analysis. Rasmussen identifies several contributing factors: the flats’ good condition, atmosphere, and impressions from the housing area and the surrounding local area, which contribute to wellbeing; and proximity to neighbours and health professionals that counteract experiences of isolation and insecurity [9]. The flats constitute homes ensuring space for physical, emotional, and spiritual life [9]. This finding resonates profoundly with Artful Ageing philosophy’s insistence on the ‘non-rational and in-between elements’ of ageing lives. The emotional and spiritual dimensions that residents describe cannot be reduced to functional accessibility or medical proximity.

For some residents, the significance of housing lies in fundamental existential anchoring. A 73-year-old woman describes how housing for older adults marked a life change after experiencing her husband and son both dying shortly apart: ‘It was a great comfort that I could move out here and live. Because it was really hard having to say goodbye to two at once’ [9]. A 68-year-old man describes housing through fundamental need for place: ‘Well, my housing… it means everything, because I have a place to be… You’re not homeless… You have a place where you can immerse yourself, find peace, be alone, and invite guests… Well, your housing is… your base’ [9]. The base metaphor captures something essential—housing as the physical anchor point from which all else proceeds. The anthropologist Michael Jackson argues that the metaphorical connection between existence and relationship to physical land and places proves significant across cultures globally [44]. ‘Everywhere’, Jackson writes, ‘people objectify their sense of being and belonging in ideas and images concerning place’ [44]. For the Guldbergs Have residents, this existential dimension helps explain housing’s profound significance and demonstrates how Housing for Artful Ageing supports what Manning terms ‘knowing-in-movement’—knowledge that is processual, embodied, and always open to revision [6,8].

4.2. Spatial Qualities and Inhabitability Infrastructure

Residents consistently express satisfaction with the layout of the individual flats. Particularly mentioned are bathrooms—large and well-appointed with space for assistive equipment—and kitchens—small and manageable yet large enough to prepare home-cooked meals. When discussing whether housing meets needs, residents consistently answer affirmatively. One man explains: ‘Yes. It does. There’s the space I need to use, right’ [9]. That housing has ‘the space I need to use’ proves significant—it is space, i.e., housing’s physical capacity, used as a starting point for his answer. That individual housing does not leave residents with unmet needs points to how it supports the lives of older adults in both concrete and abstract senses. The physical capacity residents describe leads to a more metaphorical and metaphysical capacity—what estate agent descriptions often term ‘living space’—concerning the relationship between physical space and human experience of it. What emerges is that experiences of living in suitable physical–material housing also create a ‘space’ of more-than-physical character, not measurable solely in square metres [9].

One resident has several hobby projects ongoing, giving parts of his flat a workshop character with visible tools and different ‘work stations’. These projects have space in housing, creating the impression that there is space for him as well. Others describe how they ‘work’ in housing, how housing frames concrete individual interests, such as music performance or collecting objects, or more diffuse activities, such as thinking, reading, and television-watching. All these activities relate to housing’s concrete physical space, and this space is therefore a prerequisite for experiencing the metaphysical space and phenomenological ‘living space’ [9]. The philosopher Emanuele Coccia writes that we never encounter housing’s space in pure form, as we inhabit a world also always ‘populated’ by other beings and things [45]. The empty flat is uninhabitable; it only becomes usable when there is an armchair to sit in, a bed to sleep in, a refrigerator to store food, but also books to read, a television to turn on, a puzzle to lay, tools to work with, and familiar objects to surround oneself with. Housing only becomes habitable when available space is ‘populated’ by things that, according to Coccia, give ‘reality to the space that, without these objects, is only imaginary and abstract, therefore impossible to live in’ [45]. This analysis reveals housing functioning through what Sara Ahmed terms ‘inhabitation work’ [46]—the process through which abstract geometric space becomes lived, meaningful, habitable space through personalisation, arrangement, and creative adaptation. For Housing for Artful Ageing, this means recognising that functional adequacy (proper bathroom facilities, accessible layouts) proves necessary but insufficient. Housing must also provide what we term ‘inhabitability infrastructure’—the basic spatial conditions (wall surfaces, storage systems, lighting flexibility) that enable residents to create personalised environments that support their particular ways of being and becoming.

4.3. Perforated Housing: Openness to the Surrounding World

A central finding concerns housing’s relationship to surroundings. Residents consistently report that stimuli and impressions from both the close-knit housing area and the surrounding local area significantly affect their everyday lives. Sounds, visual impressions, and atmospheric qualities permeate individual flats, shaping residents’ experiences in complex ways. One male resident describes: ‘Well, it means a lot, because… I like that things happen around me, right? I mean, others might be irritated, but I like, for example, that the kindergarten right below my windows has a playground. So when the weather permits, I open the [balcony] door, and I can hear the children. It doesn’t bother me. It gives a bit of life’ [9]. This description reveals the sounds of a close housing area finding their way into the resident’s flat when he opens his balcony door. The sound of playing children provides a sense of life that both values and actively invites into housing. Another resident values the view from his living room, characterising it as ‘rural’. He returns to the view several times during the interview, describing how the landscape he sees through the windows means much for his well-being: ‘I’ve lived many different places. And I feel really at ease here… It’s a good flat, the location is in the middle of Copenhagen. When you look out the window, a big tree, right. And… It’s relatively rural here. You don’t feel you’re living in the big city. I appreciate that’ [9]. The view is not just something occurring ‘out there’; rather, the landscape, trees, and ‘rural’ qualities also ‘work’ and experientially function both at and in housing [9].

The architects Dominique Hauderowicz and Kristian Ly Serena use the concept of ‘street porosity’ [47] to capture the phenomenon that houses, housing, and streets connect with each other in human experiential worlds. Windows can be understood as an expression of this ‘porosity’, enabling us to open and close something external into the ‘internal space’, while also letting the ‘internal space’ express itself in the ‘external’. Various forms of information and impressions, visual as well as auditory, often cross the threshold between housing and street or close area, between public and private space [9]. This analysis resonates with what might be termed ‘atmospheric architecture’ [48]—the understanding that built environments create immersive conditions affecting dispositions, moods, and possibilities for experience. For Housing for Artful Ageing, this means recognising that individual flats cannot be designed in isolation from their surroundings. The ‘porosity’ Hauderowicz and Serena describe suggests that housing boundaries are better understood as membranes—semi-permeable interfaces that enable selective exchange between the interior and the exterior [47].

4.4. Embodied Knowledge of Local Landscape

For many residents, the local landscape holds profound significance rooted in embodied knowledge accumulated over decades. One male resident describes his pleasure at living in the large two-room flat. In discussing views from windows, he says: ‘I can almost see down to Nørrebrogade, right? If there wasn’t a house in the way… And a church, and things’ [9]. He adds that he ‘almost’ can see Nørrebrogade if there weren’t a house, church, and other visual obstacles blocking sight’s free movement through the landscape to the well-known street. Because he knows the area so well from his life in the neighbourhood, the street emerges for him experientially when he sits in his flat. He has a kind of access to Nørrebrogade both when standing at the window and sitting on his sofa. Given the situation, it can be argued that he possesses a form of X-ray vision, enabling him to see through obstacles. Although he has not lived in the flat for very long, he is, in a sense, at home because he has extensive experience of the neighbourhood. Using phenomenological vocabulary, he possesses embodied knowledge—knowledge anchored in the body acquired through experience. The same embodied knowledge helps ‘inform’ his view from flat windows in a way that allows concrete visual impressions hitting his retina to dialogue with the knowledge he has acquired over many years [9].

Another resident describes the new flat’s location as just across the cemetery from his previous apartment, yet he finds the relocation challenging because he must adjust to a new position and local area. When discussing whether he feels at home, he answers clearly that he does, but one thing was difficult: ‘The only thing was… it was a new neighbourhood. I’ve always lived on the other side of the cemetery… And moved around over there, right? But I mean… You learn reasonably quickly to know the different roads and so on. Although it’s not very far, it’s a new place, right?’ [9] These examples demonstrate how residents actively relate to the surrounding area and landscape. It is not solely a question of being able to move and find one’s way, but substantially about having a sense of the place in the city and world where they find themselves. Examples clarify how residents experience being part of the local area but also point to how their wellbeing and thriving, to some extent, depend on their ‘synchronisation’ with the surrounding landscape functioning well [9].

4.5. Neighbourhood Relations: Visible and Invisible Care

Neighbourly relationships take many forms in Guldbergs Have, from active engagement to peripheral awareness. One male resident describes his neighbourhood relations: ‘Yes, yes, I certainly greet them and such, right. But I mean, we don’t see each other that much… My nearest neighbour, Lars… we talk together, and I go in there occasionally if he needs help with something, or he comes here. And we others talk down there [in the common area]. So I think we have good neighbourliness. I think I actually greet everyone living in the stairwell’ [9].

Some residents describe less active neighbourhood engagement. One woman explains how she can hear her upstairs neighbour: ‘I can hear her who lives upstairs, she walks very heavily. But she’s away travelling right now’ [9]. The description shows how this neighbour is noticeably present through everyday sounds, but also reveals detailed knowledge about this upstairs neighbour’s life. Even here, neighbourliness can be spoken of, described more quietly—one not involving togetherness and concrete interaction but nonetheless characterised by a sense of and information about surrounding living people. Another woman describes neighbourliness not involving direct contact but nonetheless contributing to her experience: ‘Yes, and it’s nice… Those drunkards are sitting there [outside the building]. But they’re not loud or anything. They sit, drink beer, and have company, but it’s outside. It’s very nice… When Klaus is up there, he plays with the radio, then it’s “I am a gypsy, and I am a gypsy, and I am a gypsy.” [laughs]’ [9]. The woman describes how she draws some atmosphere from neighbours’ lively activities into her flat, although she does not directly participate.

These examples reveal what Rasmussen terms ‘subtle neighbourliness’—forms of neighbourly relation that do not involve regular togetherness or concrete interaction but are nonetheless significant for residents’ experience of security and connection [9]. The sounds of neighbours’ movements, knowledge of their patterns and whereabouts, awareness of their activities—all constitute forms of mutual presence contributing to feeling surrounded by others.

4.6. Security and Safety Through Care Ecology

The care ecology proves particularly significant for residents’ experiences of security and safety. When asked whether they feel safe in their housing and area, residents consistently answer affirmatively. One male resident explains: ‘Yes, it does [feel safe]. I mean, you’re cared for here… I live in number [redacted], and in number 19 we have care staff’ [9]. The care ecology’s contribution to security becomes particularly clear in residents’ descriptions of the social housing officer’s role. The ‘we’ that one resident uses when describing the solving of mysteries (‘we couldn’t understand it’) reveals the experience of being an active witness to her existence [9]. She experiences being seen, heard, and helped in everyday life. This exemplifies what Basting terms ‘proof of listening’—the active demonstration that someone is genuinely hearing and valuing what the person communicates [17].

Similarly, residents’ knowledge that health professionals are accessible creates underlying security even when not actively needed: ‘It means a lot… that we have access to nurses, home helpers, and all that… So if something happens to me, I won’t be lying there for 14 days. So they have a handle on whether you’re well or not well, right’ [9]. The certainty that help can be summoned in a crisis situation promotes a needed and valued fundamental security in everyday life. The care ecology thus operates simultaneously on multiple levels. Formally designated care (social housing officer, health professionals, property office) provides crucial practical support and psychological security. Informal care elements (shopkeeper, service personnel, neighbours) contribute to ambient presence and small moments of recognition and connection. Together, these elements create what residents experience as being ‘surrounded’ and ‘enveloped’—immersed in a social environment offering multiple points of potential support and connection.

4.7. The Last Place: Housing as Final Home

An important finding concerns residents’ relationships with housing as their potential final home. When asked about future plans, the vast majority express hope to remain in Guldbergs Have for the rest of their lives. A 73-year-old woman states clearly: ‘Yes, by God, I’d rather not go to a nursing home… We hear some awful stories, yes. So no, I’d rather not. I’d rather be carried out feet first’ [9]. The formulation about being ‘carried out feet first’ appears repeatedly amongst interviewed residents, expressing the wish to complete life in their housing for older adults.

A 68-year-old man responds: ‘I think about death. I think about death almost every day. I know well that it [life] can disappear quite suddenly… I don’t have any… such future dreams’ [9]. When asked whether she thinks this is her last place, she answers: ‘Yes. Absolutely. I’m completely certain. This is my last place’. Although she contemplates death regularly, she speaks in a tone evidencing both a calm and undramatic attitude towards this event. These responses reveal housing operating as more than shelter—it becomes the site where residents envision completing their lives. As Rasmussen notes, ‘housing is these people’s last home, it is their last housing, the last place they arrange, fuss over, and care about, wherein they create a frame for their everyday life’ [9]. If death should occur somewhere safe and pleasant, coexisting with ideas about homeliness, peace, and cosiness, then housing residents themselves have helped shape must be the best place for this final life event.

The concept of ‘crip time’ proves relevant here [49]. Alison Kafer argues that ‘crip time is flex time, not just expanded but exploded; it requires reimagining our notions of what can and should happen in time’ [49]. In the context of housing for older adults as ‘the last place’, this suggests a need for what we might term ‘temporal generosity’—environmental and organisational conditions that accommodate multiple rhythms of living and dying, recognising that these processes unfold according to embodied temporalities resistant to standardisation.

5. Discussion: Towards Housing for Artful Ageing

5.1. The Care Ecology as Artful Practice

The care ecology Rasmussen documents exemplifies Artful Ageing philosophy in practice. Manning’s concept of ‘minor gestures’—small transformative movements that create possibilities for alternative ways of being [6]—finds concrete manifestation in the numerous micro-interactions that constitute the care ecology. The shopkeeper’s greeting, the neighbour’s wave from a balcony, the sound of children playing, the social housing officer’s assistance with paperwork—each constitutes a minor gesture that, in isolation, might seem insignificant but which, in ecological assemblage, creates conditions for wellbeing. Manning insists that creativity is fundamentally collective, not because multiple people participate simultaneously, but because spatial and temporal configurations create conditions where ‘knowledge at its core is collective’ can emerge [6]. The care ecology demonstrates this collectivity concretely. No single individual ‘creates’ security and well-being in Guldbergs Have. Rather, these qualities emerge from the interplay of multiple actors (residents, professionals, service personnel, neighbours), multiple spaces (individual flats, common areas, outdoor spaces, streets), and multiple temporalities (daily routines, seasonal rhythms, life trajectories). The care ecology also exemplifies what we term ‘små aldringserfaringer’—small ageing experiences [7]. These are not grand interventions or major life events but rather the accumulation of small moments: being greeted by name, hearing familiar sounds, seeing trees from a window, exchanging a few words with a neighbour, knowing help is available if needed. Individually, these experiences might seem trivial. Ecologically, they constitute the texture of meaningful everyday existence.

5.2. Design Principles for Housing for Artful Ageing

Several concrete design implications emerge from this analysis:

Graduated Privacy Systems: Moving beyond binary distinctions between private and public space towards graduated systems supporting choice in social engagement levels. This includes designing transitional spaces functioning as in-between spaces where residents can modulate their social participation.

Permeability and Porosity: Creating housing boundaries functioning as semi-permeable membranes rather than absolute barriers. This includes attention to acoustic properties (enabling awareness of neighbourhood activity without intrusion), visual connections (windows and balconies creating sightlines to outdoor life), and atmospheric qualities.

Proximity and Accessibility: Locating care and service providers within or immediately adjacent to housing areas, creating conditions for frequent informal encounters. Designing circulation routes enabling spontaneous meetings whilst allowing withdrawal for those preferring solitude.

Personalisation Infrastructure: Providing the basic spatial and material conditions enabling residents to create personally meaningful environments. This includes practical elements (appropriate wall surfaces, flexible lighting, adequate storage) and spatial qualities (varied room proportions, natural light, acoustic privacy).

Temporal Flexibility: Creating spaces accommodating different activities and rhythms across time. Rather than programming specific activities for specific spaces, designing flexible environments supporting multiple uses and enabling residents to establish their own rhythms and patterns.

Sensory Richness: Attending to sensory qualities beyond visual design—acoustic properties, material textures, thermal comfort, air quality, natural rhythms of light and darkness. Recognising that sensory experiences profoundly shape possibilities for wellbeing and creative engagement.

Local Embeddedness: Positioning housing within rather than separate from broader urban contexts. Ensuring good connections to public transport, local shops and services, cultural amenities, and green spaces.

Care Infrastructure: Designing spatial conditions supporting both formal care provision and informal care emergence—common areas enabling spontaneous encounters, circulation routes creating opportunities for checking-in, spatial proximities enabling mutual awareness.

5.3. Policy Implications

Beyond design, several policy implications emerge:

Evaluation Frameworks: Rather than measuring only functional accessibility, safety metrics, or care service provision, evaluation should assess the quality of care ecologies. This might include indicators such as the frequency and quality of informal social interactions, residents’ sense of being surrounded by care, the availability of personalisation options, and residents’ own assessments of the significance of housing.

Professional Education: Integrating understanding of care ecologies into education for architects, housing managers, and care professionals. This includes exposure to ethnographic research documenting residents’ experiences and developing sensitivity to spatial-temporal dimensions of care beyond formal service provision.

Regulatory Flexibility: Current regulations often mandate specific design features whilst constraining other possibilities. Policy should enable greater flexibility for innovative approaches that create conditions for care ecologies whilst maintaining essential safety and accessibility.

Resource Allocation: Recognising that care ecologies require resources beyond formal care services. This includes adequate staffing for social housing officers who have time for informal interaction beyond task completion, and funding for the maintenance of common areas and facilities that support spontaneous gatherings.

Temporal Allowances: Policies often mandate efficiency in care provision, but temporal compression undermines care ecologies by eliminating possibilities for informal interaction and minor gestures. Policy should allow for temporal flexibility, enabling care workers to engage socially as well as instrumentally.

Neighbourhood Integration: Avoiding concentration of vulnerable populations in segregated environments. Whilst Guldbergs Have demonstrates the benefits of housing specifically for older adults, complete segregation can create isolation. Policy should support integration within mixed-age neighbourhoods whilst maintaining sufficient concentration to enable care ecologies.

6. Limitations

Several limitations of this study require explicit acknowledgement. First, the reliance on secondary data introduces inherent constraints: while abductive reanalysis generates genuinely new theoretical insights, the original fieldwork was not designed to answer the specific questions posed in this article, and certain empirical dimensions relevant to Housing for Artful Ageing (such as longitudinal trajectories of care ecology development, or residents’ own theorising of artful practices) could not be pursued through re-engagement with existing data. Second, the limited sample size of 16 residents, whilst appropriate for qualitative depth, restricts breadth and may not capture the full range of experiences within Guldbergs Have, particularly the perspectives of residents with more advanced care needs, cognitive impairments, or very recent arrivals. Third, the single-site, single-context nature of the empirical material—a specific housing development in Copenhagen operating within Danish welfare state arrangements—limits direct generalisation. Fourth, the close involvement of one author in both the original fieldwork and the current reanalysis poses a risk of confirmation bias, which our dialogic approach mitigates but cannot fully eliminate. Fifth, the absence of longitudinal data means that care ecologies are captured at a single point in time; how they emerge, sustain themselves, or deteriorate over years, and how they are experienced by residents across different stages of frailty remain important questions for future research. These limitations point to productive directions: comparative studies across housing types and national contexts, participatory research engaging residents as co-investigators, and longitudinal ethnographic work documenting care ecology dynamics over time.

7. Conclusion: The Promise of Housing for Artful Ageing

This article develops the concept of Housing for Artful Ageing by integrating theoretical perspectives from Artful Ageing philosophy with empirical insights from housing for older adults in Copenhagen. Drawing on Rasmussen’s concept of ‘the housing area for older adults’ particular (care) ecology’, we have demonstrated how successful housing for older adults requires attention to both spatial (physical–material) and spacious (inclusive–experiential) dimensions of ageing lives. The transformative potential of Artful Ageing proves central to this framework. This approach fundamentally reconfigures our understanding of the ageing experience, transforming it from a narrative of decline into a dynamic process of becoming where physical and existential spaces intertwine to create opportunities for emancipatory experiences [8]. The transformative power emerges through what Manning terms ‘art-as-practice’ [6] and Basting describes as ‘moments of awe’ [17]—small, ephemeral encounters carrying profound potential for connection and meaning-making. The care ecology concept proves particularly valuable for Artful Ageing theory. It demonstrates concretely how ‘the non-rational and in-between elements’ of ageing lives [3] operate in practice, showing how numerous micro-interactions—individually insignificant but ecologically crucial—create conditions for wellbeing, security, and meaningful existence. The care ecology exemplifies Manning’s insight that creativity is fundamentally collective [6], emerging not from individual agency but from configurations of space, relationships, and practices enabling ‘small ageing experiences’ [7].

The detailed analysis of Guldbergs Have reveals multiple dimensions through which housing operates as Housing for Artful Ageing. Housing means ‘everything’ to residents through complex assemblages of spatial qualities, social relationships, sensory experiences, and care practices. Housing functions through graduated privacy (enabling modulation of social engagement), permeability (enabling exchange between interior and exterior worlds), embodied landscape connections (supporting ontological security), subtle neighbourliness (creating ambient presence of others), and care ecologies (surrounding residents with formal and informal support). These findings extend Artful Ageing theory in several ways. First, they demonstrate that artful processes in later life depend on particular spatial–material configurations. Second, they reveal that care cannot be reduced to formal service provision but requires attention to ecological assemblages of multiple actors, spaces, and practices. Third, they show that housing’s emancipatory potential operates situationally through ‘small cracks’ [50] rather than through grand interventions. Fourth, they demonstrate that meaningful existence in later life depends on ongoing possibilities for inhabitation work—personalising, adapting, and creatively engaging with one’s environment.

The concept of Housing for Artful Ageing thus offers an alternative to pathologising paradigms of successful and active ageing. Rather than positioning older adults as problems to be managed, Housing for Artful Ageing recognises them as creative agents engaged in ongoing processes of making meaning, establishing relationships, and constructing lives. Rather than reducing housing to functional accommodation, Housing for Artful Ageing recognises housing as a dynamic socio-material assemblage profoundly shaping possibilities for wellbeing and creative becoming. The practical implications are significant. For practitioners, this framework emphasises the need to develop sensitivity to subtle moments of connection and to value different forms of expression and engagement. For policymakers, it suggests the need to broaden our understanding of meaningful activity, active ageing, and learning in later life. Rather than focusing solely on cognitive achievement or skill acquisition, it suggests the importance of creating opportunities for creative engagement, relational experiences, and meaningful connections [8].

Looking forward, several research directions deserve emphasis. Comparative studies examining care ecologies across different housing types, locations, and cultural contexts could illuminate how local conditions shape possibilities for Housing for Artful Ageing. Longitudinal research documenting how care ecologies evolve over time could reveal dynamics of emergence, maintenance, and transformation. Participatory research that engages residents as co-researchers could deepen understanding of residents’ own theories and practices for creating meaningful environments. Design research testing specific spatial strategies for enabling care ecologies could build evidence for architectural interventions supporting Artful Ageing.

In conclusion, Housing for Artful Ageing represents more than a design approach—it constitutes a fundamental reorientation in how we understand and support ageing. It challenges us to recognise housing as the site of ongoing creative becoming rather than as a site of managed decline. It invites us to attend to small ageing experiences through which meaningful existence emerges rather than focusing exclusively on preventing negative outcomes. It asks us to create care ecologies enabling residents to experience being surrounded by others rather than relying solely on formal care programmes. The evidence from Guldbergs Have demonstrates that when housing environments successfully integrate spatial, spacious, and ecological dimensions, remarkable transformations become possible. Housing becomes more than shelter—it becomes ‘everything’, the meaningful site where lives are lived, relationships maintained, identities constructed, and existence given significance. This is the promise of Housing for Artful Ageing: creating conditions where older adults can experience later life not as inevitable decline but as an ongoing opportunity for creative engagement with life’s possibilities. As the care ecology concept demonstrates, this promise requires no radical architectural innovations or expensive interventions. Rather, it requires attention to the small elements through which meaningful existence emerges: a greeting from the shopkeeper, a wave to a neighbour, the sound of children playing, knowledge that help is available, space to pursue interests, connection to familiar landscapes, possibilities for personalisation, temporal flexibility enabling varied rhythms, and the countless other minor gestures through which older adults negotiate meaning, relationship, and belonging in everyday life. When we design, manage, and evaluate housing with attention to these dimensions, we create conditions for what Manning calls ‘minor gestures’ [6]—those small transformative movements through which new possibilities for being and becoming emerge. This is Housing for Artful Ageing: creating spaces where different rhythms can flourish and where the full complexity of ageing experience can unfold.