Most aging Americans want to stay in their own homes for as long as possible. So with the first wave of boomers hitting official retirement age next year, universal design seems destined to go mainstream. After all, by 2030, more than 70 million Americans will be over 65. But builders needn’t wait for that critical mass to start thinking about how to make their houses safer and more accessible. To the extent that universal design is just plain good design (not to mention a boon to resale value) why not start now?
For builders who want to get started, AARP offers a Livable Communities evaluation guide with specific recommendations and checklists for individual homes and whole neighborhoods. And for those looking for great examples, the winners of this year’s Livable Communities Awards, sponsored by AARP and the NAHB, prove that universal design doesn't need to look either ugly or institutional. At first glance, you’d never know some of these projects are accessible.
“Universal design is a way of offering independence, choice, and control for all people," Amy Levner, AARP manager of housing and mobility options, said during a Wednesday press conference announcing the winners at the International Builders Show (IBS) in Las Vegas. That means thinking about houses as evolutionary entities and designing them accordingly.
"In some cases there are things you can do structurally upfront to create homes that are easy to upgrade or adjust later. It’s not just about making your house perfectly accessible today, but rather putting a structure in place so your house can grow with you over time," Lavner said.
We offer a closer look at this year's winners, complete with video tours:
Green Lake Residence, Seattle
Architect: ZAI
Architect Emory Baldwin designed his own urban infill house as a demonstration home to prove that aesthetics and accessibility can easily go hand-in-hand. “An accessible home can just as easily be an attractive home that is marketable to the mainstream,” he said. This handsome little house is designed to evolve with its owners to accommodate varying life changes. Currently the residence is occupied by Baldwin’s young family, but it’s designed to eventually accommodate the architect's in-laws, whom he expects will move into the house in the years ahead. A space that currently serves as a home office and studio is primed to morph into a mother-in-law apartment. Stacked closets that are currently used to store tricycles, bikes, and strollers are framed, pre-wired, and configured to form a continuous shaft so that an elevator can be easily installed at a later date.
Other key features include zero-threshold entryways, smooth surface flooring, radiant floor heating, and an open plan that makes living spaces easily maneuverable for wheelchairs. “When you remove barriers, small spaces also seem bigger because they flow together,” Baldwin added during a case study presentation.
There's delight in many of the finer design details. One bathroom vanity, for example, is actually two pieces--a fixed countertop and sink, underneath which is a detached storage cabinet on lockable casters that can be easily rolled away to allow wheelchair access.
Take a video tour
Eskaton National Demonstration Home, Roseville, Calif.
Builder: Eskaton Senior Residences
Here's a residence that gives new meaning to "fully loaded" design. It's luxurious, sure, but it's also more than that. Certified by Green Built Home of America, this concept home integrates universal design, home automation, health and wellness technologies, and green building. Its simple, intuitive features (which are both pretty and practical) include level flooring transitions, varying countertop heights in the kitchen and bathrooms, vacancy sensor lighting, ample (and energy saving) LED lighting, raised outlets, and lowered light switches that are easy to reach. The master bath is outfitted with a curbless shower with a tile bench and a handheld shower head. Walls in that same bathroom are reinforced for towel bars that double as grab bars. (Note: They double as monkey bars for acrobatic grandchildren.) Erin Clay, director of research and planning for Eskaton, notes that older homeowners aren’t the only ones who benefit from universal design features. The kitchen's lowered countertops and table-height eating bar are kid-friendly, while work zones that allow cooks to do prep work while seated are easier on pregnant women. “Wider doors throughout the home are great for wheelchairs, but they also make it easy to move your furniture on moving day,” Clay added.
The house, which is open for tours, has generated considerable interest among curious buyers, as well as policymakers. Having sent officials to tour the home, the City of Sacramento is now developing a universal design ordinance that would require builders doing 20 units or more to have at least one model on display that is designed for accessibility. The goal? To educate consumers about the benefits of universal design.
Take a video tour
North Morningside Craftsman, Atlanta
Builder: Yorkshire Enterprises
This infill spec home blends beautifully with the other historic homes in its Atlanta neighborhood, but it offers a host of features that its neighbors do not. Among them: an elevator with access to all four floors, wide gallery-style hallways, interior doors that are a minimum of 3 feet across, and a zero-threshold patio in the side yard. The master bath includes waterproofed flooring, a roll-in shower, roll-under sinks with mirrors on swivels, and raised outlets, to name a few other choice features. “We had a friend come to visit a couple years ago with his daughter, who has cerebral palsy, and it became obvious to us immediately that our house, which was built in the 1920s, didn’t function well for a person in a wheelchair,” builder Trina Summins explained during her presentation. “That got me thinking that it shouldn’t be too hard to build a house that is accessible to all people.”
This Craftsman-style beauty isn’t outfitted head-to-toe in universal design features, but “we thought about the structural things we needed to do upfront to accommodate features that might need to be added later,” she said,” like reinforcing bathroom walls to accommodate grab bars.”
Built to Earthcraft standards, the house is not only accessible, it's green. Some of the exterior brick from the site’s original house was reused in a new fireplace mantel, while the remainder was chopped up and used as base for the driveway. Gypsum from the old house was ground up and used as soil additive. The new house is clad in a distressed brick that meshes seamlessly with older homes in the neighborhood. It's a product that plays nicely with the streetscape, but also requires minimal maintenance.
Take a video tour
NorthCenter Senior Campus, Chicago
Developer: The Lakota Group
This senior living campus on the north side of Chicago provides much-needed affordable housing within walking distance of shops, restaurants, a medical center, and two bus stops. Located on an infill site formerly occupied by a hospital, it’s also less than one mile from rapid transit. The site plan clusters two apartment buildings and one condo building (which collectively house 282 units) to form lovely shared green spaces with gardens and walking paths. Parking is relegated to the perimeter, minimizing pedestrian crossings near driveways. Although a senior center on campus offers a computer room, libraries, a gym and other amenities for an active lifestyle, connections to the outdoors were an equal priority in the planning effort, with ample attention paid to parks, fountains, landscaping, and readable outdoor signage. Architectural elements salvaged from the old hospital now stand as memory points, such as twin columns that form a portal to one of the parks.
Born out of a public-private partnership involving a long list of stakeholders--including the city of Chicago, multiple nonprofits, HUD, and the city's departments of housing and aging--it’s a project that John LaMotte, a city planner and principal with Lakota Group, hopes will serve as a prototype. “We’re going to need a lot more of these in the future,” LaMotte said. “Sustainable green building has entered the mainstream, and universal design is going the same way. There are lots of communities out there that have people aging in place, and they are going to lose them from their homes if they don’t begin to offer universal design.”
Take a video tour
For more on this year’s winning projects, visit www.aarp.org/homedesign.
Jenny Sullivan is a senior editor covering architecture, design and community planning for BUILDER.