This thesis project is undertaken to identify design elements necessary to facilitate contact with nature for Alzheimers patients in order to obtain stress relief and subsequently health benefits. Current research states that nature contact is healthful and innate to humans. Contact with nature can provide stress relief and restoration to healthy and hospitalized individuals. This stress restoration can be achieved with exercise, social support, control and positive distraction producing measurable health benefits if design elements to facilitate them are present. In this paper, we will review current nature theories and the salubrious benefits of interaction with, and access to nature. Designing therapeutic gardens to include elements that foster stress restoration is the goal.
