In putting together this year’s Showcase for the August issue, I touched base with some of those who were there in the beginning. At the time, Medquest Communications LLC, which already produced magazines focused on designing environments for the aging population as well as behavioral health and addiction treatment centers, saw an opportunity in the acute healthcare sector.
Partnering with The Center for Health Design, this founding team sought to “help change the design thinking” in the industry with a publication that coupled content produced by industry thought leaders with projects that illustrated the possibilities, says Mark Goodman, HCD magazine’s founder and first publisher. “The idea was [to see] how can content drive change.”
When I asked Goodman about that first issue, he recalled the challenge with picking out a cover image. Back then, Design Showcase submissions were organized into individual binders that included project details as well as printed project images. After poring through dozens of binders and hundreds of images, Goodman says, the editorial team chose an exterior image of Cleveland Clinic Florida Hospital in Naples, Fla., displaying a fountain with a statue of two figures, one carrying the other.
“It showed empathy,” Goodman says, illustrating the magazine’s founding mission: “to celebrate spaces that create empathy for everyone inside.”…