Brunnsgästens resa i tid och rum – om hälsobrunnens parker och trädgårdar

Abstract

Time and Space in the Spa Visitor’s Experience The space of the Spa is shaped by the Spa visitor’s timecontrolled movement. Controlled by the water-cure and the course of treatment, they moved between and within places with different character and function inside the Spa Garden. The time experience consists of both the experience of following the precise schedule through the water-cure and the experience of history. History is an underlying part of the present experience of the Spa visitor through the history of water and different ancient monuments as well as the history of the landscape surrounding the Spa that could be viewed from inside. The Spa is a closed space as a whole; with certain views to the outside, as well as it is a well-defined place. The first “place-shaping” factor is the shield from the surroundings and the distinct difference between outside and inside through the fence and the entrance fee. A symbol of passing from the outside to the inside lies in the water and its liminal qualities. By drinking the water in the first glass of the course of treatment the first step is taken towards shaping of an “inside-space”. The movement, a necessary factor in space-shaping, then starts with slow walking to make the water “more efficient” within the body. After each glass of water a few minutes of slow walking was mandatory and after the last glass a 30 minutes walk was prescribed. This required a space for short walks adjacent to the well as well as a larger park space not so far from the well. The space closest to the well had many restrictions, such as the necessity of benches for resting, trees for shadow and dry grounds. Since the larger park space was well visited, a number of rare trees and beautiful flower plantings were frequently put there as a delight and a brilliant display. These two spaces, where the visitor was the most time controlled, were the first spaces in the Spa visitors experience and together they can be called the well-drinking space. In the afternoons, the water-cure schedule permitted shorter travels to beautiful places in the surroundings for walking or longer walks and other activities within the Spa’s own park space. These “walking-spaces” often meant a larger degree of nature experience than the well-drinking spaces, which is somewhat connected to the belief that the nature was healing and not entirely dangerous, evolving from Rousseau’s ideas during the early decades of the 1800s in Sweden. However, an experience of nature as a beautiful place has existed longer than that and an experience of “the beautiful” and trips to surrounding nature has been a part of the Spa programme and water-cure since the first Spa well was founded in Sweden at Medevi 1678. The trips to surroundings and the walks in the scenery often included vistas and views over monuments or beautiful landscape sceneries. As a part of the visitor’s experience of space, the beautiful view of the landscape and the walk to this view can symbolise the essence of the Spa idea; better health and a sense of calm through movement and an experience of time and space.