At Caledonia Senior Living & Memory Care, we take great pride in the traditions of care, compassion and warmth that led the Illinois Saint Andrew Society – today known as Chicago Scots – to build the Scottish Home in North Riverside more than 100 years ago. Since that time, we have worked diligently to provide top-quality care and remain a leader in the aging services field. In 2016, this commitment led us to open the MacLean House, a Memory Care household licensed as Assisted Living, on our five-acre campus. The design of the MacLean House was based on the latest research and best practices, and was designed to look and feel – indeed to be – a comfortable, Prairie-style home.
Today we are excited to announce the next chapter of our campus evolution: the reimagining and revitalization of the Scottish Home. It’s time to turn our attention to restoring our beloved legacy building that is both the heart of our senior living campus and of our Scottish cultural membership community. The Scottish Home has been home thousands of residents and their families for over 100 years and now it’s our turn to care for the building. Our project will begin with updates to our hallways, assisted living apartments and some of our nursing care suites. Later phases of our project will include other community spaces in the Scottish Home.
Together with our partner organizations, Worn Jerabek Wiltse Architects. P.C. and Strong Design Consultants, LLC, we have already begun the process of evaluating the current space and planning ways to revitalize our environment and add even more charm to our historic legacy building. We are looking forward to updating carpet, wallpaper, paint, lighting and more.
Martha Strong of Strong Design Consultants, LLC who will be heading up the interior design team for the project describes the building as “having a soul”. Strong, who started her career at the architecture firm of Jensen & Halstead, originally founded as Jensen & Mundie by William Bryce Mundie who designed the Scottish Home, clearly understands and respects the history and character of our beloved building and is excited to give it a fresh look that is still in keeping with the character of the building.
Our fantastic maintenance team has already begun working in-house to renovate the apartments in the Scottish Home, including those in Sheltered Care (our assisted living-like option with added benefits) and the Georgeson suites in intermediate care. These renovations are completed thoughtfully on a rolling basis with the goal of causing as little disruption in daily life as possible. Stop by for a tour and our marketing team would be happy to show you the “before and after” apartments in person.
Fundraising for the “Reimagined Tradition” campaign began earlier this year and has already shown extremely successful results. “Within the first two months of fundraising, our team was able to secure more than enough money to get the first phase of the project started,” said Siân Stevens, Chief Operating Officer of Caledonia Senior Living & Memory Care and Chicago Scots. “It’s a real testimony to the relationships the organization has formed. Most communities like ours borrow money to renovate. We are proud of the fact that we are now debt free and able to do a project like this entirely with the support of friends of our organization.”