The Universal Design concept is about integrating unique features into home plans in an effort to enhance comfort and convenience for today’s lifestyle, combined with the ability to adapt to tomorrow’s changing needs without extensive remodeling. The features are virtually invisible and certainly not obvious, but these houses make life so much easier for everyone in the household. Because opening doors with arms full of groceries is just as difficult in your 30s as it is in your 70s, for example, universally designed homes use lever-type door handles. There is a long list of universal design features that homeowners can choose from when designing a home that is safe, comfortable, visitable, and easy to use by people of almost any age or physical ability.
What makes a home ‘forever’? It simply means that it was carefully designed with the comfort and needs of people of all ages and physical characteristics in mind! It doesn’t matter if you are young or old, short or tall, healthy or sick. You may have a disability or be an award-winning athlete. You may have had recent surgery or sprained an ankle or hurt your back. You can be a personal trainer in perfect health working at a local gym. Really do not care. Thanks to universal design, very different people can enjoy the same house. And that home will be there for all its inhabitants even when their needs change.
Today’s homebuyers seek homes that are a haven of security and comfort. Whether it’s having a couple of friends over for an intimate dinner or the whole gang over for a Super Bowl party, most of us like to use our homes to entertain. We delight in welcoming guests and making them feel comfortable. Think about the house you live in now. Is it truly hospitable? Is it ‘visitable’ by friends and loved ones regardless of age or physical limitations?
The universal design makes it much easier to live and entertain in a home. In addition, the features increase the safety and comfort of all occupants. From the day you move in, when movers maneuver your precious possessions without bumping into walls or doors, you’ll appreciate the spacious feeling. Move furniture, luggage, shopping bags, strollers, and even sleeping babies around your home with ease. And as we get older, you won’t need to make expensive modifications. They are already here.
Some of the most common universal design features are:
o Entrance without steps. No one needs to use stairs to enter a universal house or the main rooms of the houses. There are no steps leading from the garage to the house or patio, making the house ‘visitable’ by friends and family who may have a physical limitation.
o Even in a 2-story home, the kitchen, living room, dining room, one bedroom, and at least one bathroom would be on the main level with minimal barriers.
o 36-inch wide doors allow free passage of furniture, luggage, laundry baskets, people, and even wheelchairs. Wide doorways also make it easy to move large things like beds, sofas, and appliances in and out of the house.
o Aisles must be at least 42 inches wide. Wider hallways allow everyone and everything to move more easily from room to room.
o Open floor plans make everyone feel less crowded and allow people traffic to flow more smoothly. It also makes the house feel bigger, lighter, and brighter.
o Strategically placed large windows allow you to take advantage of the views and allow more sunlight into the home to help chase away winter stagnation.
o You can choose cabinet hardware that is both easy to grip and beautiful.
o Other useful features in your home can also be planned, such as a work area in your kitchen where the kids or grandkids can help make cookies, or adding an instant hot water dispenser for a faster, safer, and more convenient way to heat water for soups and mixes. You could build a desk near your kitchen where the kids can do their homework under your watchful eye. You might even identify an area in the home layout that could easily be divided as a mother-in-law suite or a caregivers retreat in the future.
Convenience Features
Most of the universal design features just make sense. Once you build them in your home, you’ll wonder why not all houses are built this way. For example:
o Non-slip surfaces in bathtubs and floors help everyone stay on their feet. They are not just for fragile people.
o Raised dishwashers minimize bending to load and unload dishes.
o Good lighting helps people with vision problems. And it also helps everyone else to see better.
o Lever-type door handles and rocker light switches are great for people with arthritis or low hand strength. But everyone else likes them too. Try using these devices when your arms are full of packages. You’ll never go back to using round knobs or standard light switches again.
Features for later
Universal design gives you great home features you can enjoy now, but also helps you plan for the future. Good universal design strives to create an attractive, non-institutional-looking home that is comfortable and safe for everyone, regardless of age or ability. Done correctly, the universal design becomes virtually invisible, increasing market appeal and never detracting from the overall design. In fact, many of the features seem so intuitive that most people don’t even notice them until they are pointed out.
While the concept of designing homes to be user-friendly and stage-of-life-enhancing has been around for a few years, it’s only now attracting a lot of interest. The reason? Almost everyone agrees that universally designed homes can better keep youth and adults living safely and comfortably where they prefer to live: in their own homes and neighborhoods.
Universally designed homes also offer benefits to caregivers. Many of the design features, such as curving showers with integral seats and hand showers, better equip the resident to participate in their own care, reducing the number and/or frequency of caregiver attendance. Bathroom injuries are reduced for all users and maintaining a reasonable degree of self-care can help people retain a sense of well-being and self-determination.
The best opportunity to incorporate universal design is in the design process of new homes. When integrated before construction, universal design can add as little as four percent to the cost of a new home. Most agree that eliminating a single fall at home or reducing home care will more than make up for the initial investment. And the increased potential to satisfy independence is priceless.
The possibilities are endless. When choosing a new home or home plan, look for some universal design elements to ensure a more convenient, safer, and more profitable lifestyle in your new home.