Home > Journal > Issue Ten > Architects disable: A challenge to transform

Architects disable: A challenge to transform - Rob Kitchin
1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 / 6

A new philosophy
Given the discussion so far, it is my contention that architects have a moral imperative to address the disabling consequences of architectural design. Architecture, I believe, should be enabling. And architects should be should be designing and constructing universally accessible buildings. This means rejecting, for example, Le Corbusier's or Frank Lloyd Wright's conceptions of designing for 'modular man' based on their conception of 'normality' (a premise that still implicitly underpins much architecture, even that which claims not be modernist). It requires instead a recognition of the full diversity of ability across people and adopting the tenets of universal design - design that facilitates access for everybody. This is not to say that form, aesthetics, structural engineering, are not equally important, but that at the heart of any design should be a recognition that what is being designed, whether it's a public toilet or a skyscraper, should be accessible to everybody regardless of impairment and that this access is equal (that access does not become two-tiered, e.g. round the back and through the kitchens). At no point should access be sacrificed to other concerns, especially aesthetics. The tenets of universal design should not be viewed as additions to a toolkit, or as something to be occasionally or selectively used, but as fundamental shift in how architecture is practised. A new, generic way of thinking. As such, it should not be taught as a separate module during training, it should be inherent to the whole practice as an underlying ethos.

New practices
Along with reformulating theory underpinning practice, I believe there should be a parallel investigation into new modes of emancipatory practice. In relation to disability, this means a recognition that architects unless disabled themselves do not know what it is like to be disabled. One of the big fallacies that many disabled people are presently fighting against, in relation to all kinds of professionals who affect their life (e.g. social workers, doctors, community workers, planners, and so on), is that these professionals know best; that they understand disability, and what it is like to be disabled, and know what would be most suitable for a disabled person. Imagine if every part of your life was mediated by someone else. That somebody decided that because your legs or eyes or ears or whatever did not function in the same way as the majority of people that you were also incapable of being able to think and act for yourself; that you were incapable of knowing how buildings disable you and how this might be remedied. The simple and most effective solution to creating inclusive buildings is to consult with all users of the building, focusing particularly on those populations who might have different needs. This means blending the expert knowledges of architects with the tacit knowledges of disabled people. This has an important side-benefit in that it empowers those disabled people at the same time as it seeks to emancipate them from 'design apartheid'. The logic of this participatory approach with disabled people has now been well explored outside of architecture.