16 February 6, 2022The Sunday TimesHome
innovative and liberating
approach to dementia care
that it now attracts a long
waiting list. After 26 years,
Middleton Hall has reached
another milestone. It is
regarded as the John Lewis of
retirement villages — the first
to be owned by its employees.
Plans are afoot to build more.
Walford arrived at
Middleton Hall with a
notebook and calculator
in 1996 when it was a
failing nursing home
and came up with
a rescue plan.
Within four years
he was running
the business. He
initiated a
buildingM
iddleton Hall
doesn’t look
like a
retirement
village or,
indeed, a dementia care
home. Set in 45 acres with
lakes and ponds, gardens and
a croquet lawn, this red-brick
enclave in Darlington,
Co Durham, is the vision of
one man, Jeremy Walford,
whose father David’s diagnosis
of vascular dementia has
inspired a new of way of living.
Yet dementia is barely
mentioned here. People living
with the condition are
described as residents of
Middleton Oaks, a cluster of
“small group living” houses.
These are light, bright,modern, student-style
bungalows of eight en suite
bedrooms, each with a big bay
window and patio door. They
are linked by an enclosed
garden and residents share
a sitting room, kitchen and
dining room. Outside there
are chickens and ducks, so
residents can collect fresh
eggs each morning.
Staff — “team members” —
don’t all wear uniforms. There
are no locked doors or gates.
Instead of dementia residents
being locked away out of sight,
you will find them either
dancing, singing, preparing a
meal, doing some gardening
or following a trail of yellow
brick footprints on a walk.
Such is Middleton’sCroquet, dancing and feeding ducks: is this
the future of dementia care? By Jane Slade
‘MY FATHER’S
DIAGNOSIS
CHANGED MY LIFE’