As a gay man who is neurodiverse and married to someone from a racial minority background, inclusive design is more than a professional interest; it’s personal.
Navigating spaces that weren’t designed with people like me in mind has shaped my understanding of what it means to belong in the built environment.
For the neurodiverse, the built environment can sometimes feel like a maze of challenges. Spaces that are too cluttered, or visually overwhelming can make it difficult to focus or feel at ease. I’ve experienced firsthand how small changes, clearer signage, quieter areas, or logical layouts, can make a world of difference in how I experience a space.
Being a gay man adds another layer to this conversation. Inclusivity also means creating spaces that feel safe, free from judgment or hostility. I’ve found that some environments, while functional, can lack the subtle signals that say, “you’re welcome”.
Inclusive design isn’t just about step-free access or sensory-friendly environments. It encompasses all characteristics protected under the Equality Act: age, gender, neurodiversity, faith, sex, disability, pregnancy and parenthood, culture and customs. It aims to remove barriers and enable everyone to participate equally, confidently, and independently in our places but also our economy and society.
If you think it would only affect a tiny percentage of the population, think again. With 1 in 4 of the UK population disabled, 1 in 5 from ethnic minority backgrounds, 1 in 30 identifying as LGBTQ+, and a rapidly ageing society inclusive design is about you, your family and your friends.
The moral case is a pretty easy one to make, but inclusive design also drives commercial benefits. An inclusive building is a future proofed one.
Just as environmental credentials have become a minimum requirement for high-quality space, we expect inclusive design to do the same in the coming years. We can see this emerging as occupiers increasingly inquire about the accessibility of buildings in leasing due diligence, knowing that this is important not only for their reputation but also to their access to the widest possible wide talent pool and customer base.
When we started to interrogate inclusive design as part of our People.Planet.Positive sustainability strategy, we found many barriers and questions, but also a groundswell of support for solutions. So, two years ago, we embarked on a project with The Crown Estate breaking down the topic of into three areas: new developments, existing buildings, and the business case for inclusive design.
At the heart of our approach was bringing together lived and learnt experience – particularly engaging with people with a personal perspective as well as experts to challenge our outlook and ambition.
Inclusive Spaces and Places, the resulting report, consolidates research, data, and insights from this process outlining the value of inclusive design and tackling what we found to be common knowledge, technical or organisational challenges towards the subject.
Alongside this, we have adopted and encourage others to adopt, five commitments.
- Listening to people with lived experience: Understand and engage with those who have lived experience across a range of characteristics.
- Measuring and understanding accessibility: for existing buildings and spaces to inform key interventions.
- Communicate accessibility: so people can feel more confident using existing buildings and spaces.
- Exceeding building regulations: to create a higher inclusive design standard.
- Collaborating and educating: to ensure accessibility and inclusive design are considered for both new developments and existing buildings.
We have also published tools and resources such as an inclusive design brief and guidance on lived experience panels to support delivery.
At these commitments are already in action. We recently ran a lived experience panel for our South Molton scheme, involving people from various backgrounds to provide input on public realm plans. Our key takeaway was the importance of small measures that make significant differences to people’s experience of a space. The recent expansion of our collaboration with Sociability at Liverpool ONE provided accessibility information to over 8,000 people in the first five weeks.
Looking ahead we will be creating an inclusive design baseline for our portfolio. This will allow us to understand what improvements or changes will need to be made to our buildings and where the biggest wins could be from a design perspective. We will also be building on the scope of a new industry working group, which alongside ourselves and , has 12 partners and five already committed to the full report recommendations.
Click here to read the report and access the tools and resources and contact ܰ찪gDzԴǰ.cdz if you would like more information on the working group.