If good design is inclusive design, then inclusive design is sustainable design

In early October 2022, while walking home from work, I took a tumble on the streets of Munich because I didn’t see a black brick that was part of a fencing system to mark a newly assigned construction zone. This brief moment in time has had a profound effect and required a complete overhaul of my life - one that I will recover from but one that has increased my empathy for those who live with barriers on a daily basis.

On December 3 the UN annually recognises the International Day of Persons with Disabilities. I am but one person with one small glimpse into the larger realities experienced by 15% of the world’s population but if seven targets of the Sustainable Development Goals explicitly refer to persons with disabilities, I’ll take this personal experience to serve as an awakening to help me shape my thinking and actions as it relates to my role as a designer, where I am defining sustainable action to holistically incorporate the social, environmental and economic impacts of design.

Beyond the journey of surgery, recovery and ongoing process of learning to walk again, my experience has highlighted the need to more intentionally acknowledge the intersection of inclusive design with sustainability.

The British Standards Institute defines inclusive design as:

“The design of mainstream products and/or services that are accessible to, and usable by, as many people as reasonably possible without the need for special adaptation or specialised design.”

Designing for inclusivity serves to increase the sustainability of the design because the outcome is better able to serve the needs of the people who utilise the digital or physical product, service, or built environment over time.

Being a sustainable citizen can be hard to maintain if the design of products or services don’t intuitively and easily guide me to the best option. Due to my inability to walk, I had to choose the path of least resistance for most things, which highlighted that often sustainable solutions are ‘too specialised’ or exclusive. We want to use less water, less energy, less material and then some but as I journeyed through my day-to-day activities, this was not always easy to accomplish.

Design briefs need to have a focused scope to ensure we answer the right question but without a mindset for changing the whole, we risk missing out on the interdependencies of ecosystems that can shape more inclusive and sustainable options. We are at a critical moment where any new design cannot ignore the marriage of inclusive and sustainable design metrics.

While one post cannot solve all things, this personal experience has enabled me to better articulate (and more deeply feel) what sustainable design can and should become.