Currently, the various cousins and alter-egos of universal design (accessible design, inclusive design, human-centred design) remain in the realm of selected advocates. For many architects and designers, this is considered a ?speciality? area of design, pursued by few and mastered by fewer. A growing body of accessibility specialists has seen the opportunity left by the void in the profession and is helping to fill it, providing design services that often could be provided by architects.
Lobby of 100 Broadview Avenue in Toronto, a residential conversion designed by Quadrangle with human-centred principles and universal access. Photo by Brandon Barre.
Part of our obligation as architects is to help drive social change. In my own capacity as an architect and the Accessibility Champion at Human Space, Quadrangle?s recently launched social-impact consultancy division, I recognized that it?s time for all architects and designers to incorporate the broad spectrum of universal design principles into their everyday practices. Our building codes and regulations are by nature slow to evolve, and consistently represent a bare minimum rather than good practice. Architects and designers should not rely on these baseline regulations for guidance, but should instead strive to move from basic compliance to best practice. Much has been written about why we need to pay more attention to universal design, largely focused on our aging population and the associated increase in physical limitati...