Inclusive design

Steve Maslin
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I became interested in design that includes disabled people during my studies 20+ years ago, which led me to receiving an Access Prize for one of my designs. After I qualified as an architect I also worked with disabled people for Social Services.

Several years ago, I was approached by Stride Treglown and was then able to become a Consultant Member of National Register of Access Consultants, through the relatively unusual combination of experiences that I had gained.

As an access consultant, my role is about providing advice to both the client and design teams regarding the relationship between costs and risk, between investment and value, and between design decisions and how one might manage buildings inclusively, once completed.

How do you define ‘inclusive’ design?

SM: Simply put, it is designing for everyone – including disabled people. We also call this ‘universal design’. It is not just about wheelchair users, but people who have difficulty with movement, vision, hearing, learning and/or language. It includes children/parents, pregnant mothers and elderly people.

I compare it with a pair of spectacles; although I have difficulty seeing without spectacles, I am not considered disabled. Likewise, rather than the focus being on someone’s disability, the aim is to design environments that can be managed in a way that ‘enables’ rather than ‘disables’.

Is this still a relatively new concept? How much awareness do you see in this part of the world?

SM: The concept of inclusive design has only gained momentum in countries such as the US, UK and Australia within the last 20 years – due to legal requirements. Even so, the relationship between design and the psychological wellbeing of occupants is still little understood, even though it impacts employees and customers, and can affect clients’ productivity and revenue earning activity. This is a subject in which I have particular interest.

Inclusive design is still a much newer concept in many parts of the Middle East, where there is a need for design guidance. Many buildings and external places lack the application of inclusive design.

Inclusive design considerations very much depend on the nationality of the design teams involved.
However, as with sustainability, there are signs that this is about to change.

Where countries are embracing not only environmental sustainability, but social and economic sustainability, there is the potential to take inclusive design forward at a faster pace than elsewhere.

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SM: Where designs are inclusive, people function better, and the environments created can be considered to be more valuable. Inclusive design is about investment in our most precious resource, people, and is therefore about sustainability.

Can you highlight a project that you have worked on that is particularly inclusive?

SM: We have recently been working on an interior design concept for a competition-winning entry for a drug rehabilitation centre at Bosence Farm, Cornwall, in the UK. Because the psychological wellbeing of people fighting drug addiction is especially important, the focus has been on the interior use of colour.

Whilst maintaining a relatively neutral but warm background, the aim is, with the input of local artists, photographers and then residents, to introduce photographic images of local scenery at selected locations within the building, with colour extracted from these images.

When it comes to making designs inclusive, what advice would you give to interior designers working in this part of the world?

SM: Go beyond just wheelchair user access to sensory and psychological aspects of inclusive design.

Understand the relevance of inclusive design to the sustainability agenda, the relevance of the cultural context and the relationship between capital investments made by your clients, the productivity of their staff and the willingness of their clients do business.