Interior Architecture as a discipline of the future: how spaces influence our health and wellbeing

What are the issues shaping interior architecture today and in the future? Alongside questions of sustainability, the transformation of existing building stock and the use of AI, one aspect is increasingly coming into focus: the impact of spaces on our health and wellbeing. After all, interior architecture does not only shape function and aesthetics - it influences how we live, work, learn and regenerate.

In cooperation with BDIA

The Association of German Interior Architects (Bund Deutscher Innenarchitektinnen und Innenarchitekten e.V., BDIA) addresses this development with its annual theme for 2026, deliberately focusing on the interactions between space, design, and physical and mental health. In doing so, an expanded understanding of interior architecture becomes visible: health is not viewed as a separate specialist topic, but as an integral outcome of good planning.

Impulses for this perspective come, among others, from bdia interior architect Charleen Grigo, who engages intensively with the connections between spatial design and health. She makes it clear: “Interior architecture plays a decisive role in how healthily we live, work and recover.” This statement points to a fundamental reality - we spend the majority of our lives indoors. Accordingly, the influence that designed environments have on our physical and psychological balance is considerable.

The annual theme “Aesthetics and Health: How Interior Architecture Influences Our Wellbeing” builds precisely on this idea. It broadens the focus beyond traditional healthcare architecture and considers the full spectrum of interior architectural tasks: working environments, educational facilities, living spaces, care settings or hospitality concepts. In all of these contexts, spaces are created that structure everyday life, provide orientation, promote social interaction and can reduce strain.

Approaches such as “healing architecture” exemplify how design can be used in a targeted way to promote wellbeing. At the same time, it becomes clear that these principles must not remain limited to medical facilities. Rather, the aim is to understand spaces in general as an active resource - as environments that strengthen resilience, enable concentration and secure quality of life.

Grigo aptly describes this effect as an “invisible medicine, without side effects, yet with an immediate impact on body and mind.” This makes a paradigm shift tangible: interior architecture is no longer merely about designing shells, but a key factor in creating health-oriented environments.

Against the backdrop of societal challenges such as increasing stress, changing ways of working and demographic change, this understanding is becoming ever more significant. Interior architects are taking responsibility for spaces that do more than simply enable people to function - they support and strengthen them.

The Interior Architecture Summit in Berlin, taking place from 13 to 15 November 2026, builds on these questions and brings together professionals from practice, research and planning. At its core is the question of how interior architecture, as a discipline, can help shape healthy living environments - today and in the future.

Rendering: © Studio Esser