Interior Design Dilemmas in a Shared Room of Silence

Abstract

This text sheds light on the delicate practice of including different religious as well as nonreligious expressions in a shared room. The effects of design decisions in a "room of silence" at a Swedish hospital are studied over a transitional period of renovation of the space. We observe the impact of materiality in the room's establishment, renovation, and usage, and show how the room's interior design, its decor and objects, are conditioned by ritual acts as well by practical and spontaneous place-making processes. By following how the negotiations of the interior space relate to presupposed separations of aesthetic and religious ideals, we see how the design of a room of silence can allow several religious groups to comfortably use one common room; but also how design can cause clashes between different interests and how materiality is forced in the end to advice a clear spatial distinction between different types of usage in the room.