The Architects Redefining Aesthetics

In typical buildings, accommodations for the visually or hearing impaired tend to be small and scattered: braille on signs and beside elevator buttons; flashing lights on fire alarms; guardrails abutting stairs or ramps. Since the Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA) established design requirements in 1990, these little touches have become commonplace, markers of the effort to universalize spaces that weren’t built to be universal.

But these accommodations are afterthoughts, partial measures. Buildings are still full of obstacles and inconveniences for people who don’t navigate by sight and sound. Doorways and halls are too