A history of design that is often overlooked--until we need it
Have you ever hit the big blue button to activate automatic doors? Have
you ever used an ergonomic kitchen tool? Have you ever used curb cuts to
roll a stroller across an intersection? If you have, then you've
benefited from accessible design--design for people with physical,
sensory, and cognitive disabilities. These ubiquitous touchstones of
modern life were once anything but. Disability advocates fought
tirelessly to ensure that the needs of people with disabilities became a
standard part of public design thinking. That fight took many forms
worldwide, but in the United States it became a civil rights issue;
activists used design to make an argument about the place of people with
disabilities in public life.
In the aftermath of World War II, with injured veterans returning home
and the polio epidemic reaching the Oval Office, the needs of people
with disabilities came forcibly into the public eye as they never had
before. The US became the first country to enact federal accessibility
laws, beginning with the Architectural Barriers Act in 1968 and
continuing through the landmark Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990,
bringing about a wholesale rethinking of our built environment. This
progression wasn't straightforward or easy. Early legislation and design
efforts were often haphazard or poorly implemented, with decidedly mixed
results. Political resistance to accommodating the needs of people with
disabilities was strong; so, too, was resistance among architectural and
industrial designers, for whom accessible design wasn't "real" design.
Bess Williamson provides an extraordinary look at everyday design,
marrying accessibility with aesthetic, to provide an insight into a
world in which we are all active participants, but often passive
onlookers. Richly detailed, with stories of politics and innovation,
Williamson's Accessible America takes us through this important
history, showing how American ideas of individualism and rights came to
shape the material world, often with unexpected consequences.
