Sustainable architecture of the future requires universal design

Universal design is an important tool towards a more socially sustainable future; it is a way to ensure that we create a framework and environment that embraces as many as possible, and in which we truly reflect the bodily diversity that people bring — without compromising on architectural quality.

“The book offers knowledge about the history and intention of the concept, about the connection between architectural quality and universal design, and about how the concept can be interpreted and operationalized,” says Camilla Ryhl.

The Book Universal Design in Architecture consists of two parts; a theoretical mapping of universal design and the history of the concept; and an implementation part that examines, through ten interview interviews with renowned and award-winning Danish and Norwegian architects, how universal design can be operationalized and applied in practice.

The interviews reveal how the concept of universal design has a huge potential to create value in architecture, but also that it regularly encounters resistance and barriers to implementation in practice. And it is precisely this contradiction that inspired Camilla Ryhl to write the book, she says.

Universal design is more than just accessibility
“Through my many years of work as a researcher and teacher, I have discovered, as I do in this book, that there is too narrow an understanding of universal design as a concept that creates resistance. When the concept is perceived as a restrictive set of rules that deal primarily with minimum requirements for physical accessibility, resistance arises,” the author notes.

Ryhl emphasizes that it is essential that universal design be communicated as more than rulebook and physical accessibility. It is about the human vision and how we consider the value and necessity of including everyone — regardless of functional capacity — when creating the architecture of the future,” it reads.

In the book, Camilla Ryhl highlights how universal design can be used as a means of promoting social sustainability by ensuring equal access to architecture through the built-in recognition, which lies in the concept that all people are different and have different levels of functioning. For example, about 30 percent of Danes live with some permanent or temporary disability.

A tool for new knowledge
And that is precisely what our architecture must accommodate, so that a diverse and equal participation in the built environment is ensured, believes Camilla Ryhl, who also uses the book to show how the concept can be made operational in concrete work in practice.

“Based on my experience as a teacher and researcher, I present, among other things, an interpretative model that shows how to work with universal design as a value, a process and a solution. And then I present an understanding of universal design that embraces all our senses and thus requires entirely new understanding of solutions, which hopefully can create some new insights in practice.”

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In 2015, Denmark committed itself to the global agenda of Leave No One Behind, and here too, universal design can be an important and useful tool if we really believe that the SDGs are something that we as a country want to live up to, the author believes.

Universal design challenges our blind spots and forces us to look critically at the perception of the “normal” body. This is necessary when we have made a commitment — including through the UN — to bring more people on board and leave no one on the platform
_{- Camilla Ryhl, Research Director at the Bevica Foundation}

_‍The Bevica Foundation has supported the publication of the book precisely to create dialogue and conversation about universal design as a value-creating lever for inclusion, diversity and quality in architecture.

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