Ronald Mace and Universal Design
- Brittney BLTD
- Dec 14, 2025
- 8 min read
The idea that good design doesn't require adaptations for anyone to use and the man that pioneered the concept
The fight for equality for people with disabilities in the United States began in the early 1800s; a time that saw the creation of formal education for deaf and deaf-blind people, as well as the invention of Braille in 1821. However, the US Government wouldn’t take a stand until 1973 with the Rehabilitation Act. This was significant because not only did it prohibit discrimination based on disability within the government, but it also extended those protections to federally funded programs, as well as imposing employment protections for government contractors.
The same language that defined discrimination in the Rehabilitation Act was used 17 years later, in 1990, for The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) to extend those same protections to all Americans in many facets of life. While both pieces of legislature have been monumental, there is one man whose work influenced their creation that one could argue had an even more profound impact on disability rights worldwide. Which makes it surprising that his name isn’t well known.
Experiencing disability in the first half of the 20th century
Ronald Mace was a pioneer in the field of architecture, leading the development of the concept of Universal Design. Mace was born a healthy child in 1940. At the age of 9, he contracted polio and was required to use a wheelchair for the rest of his life. He grew up in a time when the world was not a friendly place for those with disabilities.
Disabled people in the first half of the 20th century would have found the world to be very isolating. If they were not institutionalized, employment discrimination prevented them from earning a living. Aside from the societal exclusion, architecture that was not designed with mobility needs in mind would have made accessing most buildings impossible. This meant they couldn’t access stores, libraries, post offices, schools, etc. The places we all need to access.
The early 20th century saw rapid progress and development in the field of medicine. This meant that by World War II, field medics and surgeons could save soldiers with disabling injuries that they wouldn’t have survived in World War I. These soldiers left to fight for freedom and returned home to a country they could no longer access. These disabled soldiers became powerful and effective advocates for change.
The trauma of war caused what were called stress casualties, and there were mental health services on the front lines. The goal was far from altruistic, intending to return soldiers to active duty as quickly as possible. However, the practices did lead to expansion of those services to civilians back in the US after the war. President Harry S. Truman signed the National Mental Health Act of 1946, allocating federal funding for research, education, training, and treatment of mental illness.
Ronald Mace
Mace graduated from North Carolina State University with a degree in architecture in 1966. There, he faced architectural barriers that his peers had never even considered. The bathroom doors were not wide enough to accommodate his wheelchair and he had to be carried on the stairs to and from classes. While Mace remained determined and overcame those challenges, one must acknowledge the indignity of a college aged person needing to be carried by professors or peers. These experiences would no doubt contribute to his drive to change the field of architecture.
After graduation, he worked for four years designing normal homes and buildings. He then decided to shift his focus to accessible housing design. He would play an integral role in drafting the first accessible building codes for North Carolina, enacted in 1973. In 1974, Mace’s Illustrated Handbook of the Handicapped Section of the North Carolina State Building Code was published. These contributions would lay the groundwork for sections of the Fair Housing Amendments Act of 1988 and the ADA in 1990.
In 1974 Mace founded Barrier Free Environments, Inc. It was a consulting firm focused on accessibility and universal design. In addition to design consultant, Mace also carried titles such as teacher, researcher, author, lecturer, mediator, and expert witness. His clients included disability organizations, architects, attorneys, corporations, and more. Many Federal, State, and Local governments employed his services, hence his great influence on those historic legislations.
Mace established the Center for Accessible Housing at the School of Design at his alma mater. It was later renamed The Center for Universal Design. Here, Mace’s Seven Principles were instilled in new generations of designers and architects. It was a federally funded program that sadly lost its funding in 2008 and has been inactive since.
Ronald Mace passed away suddenly in 1998 from complications from polio. He was only 56 years old. Though his life and career were cut short, his legacy will live on for generations in the designs we use today and the ones yet to be conceived.
What is Universal Design?
Universal Design is defined as the design and composition of an environment so that it can be accessed, understood, and used to the greatest extent possible by all people, regardless of their age, size, ability, or disability. “Environment” includes physical locations, as well as products and services. The Centre for Excellence in Universal Design in Dublin, Ireland adds, “Environments should be designed to meet the needs of all people who wish to use it. This is not a special requirement for the benefit of only a minority of people. It is a fundamental condition of good design.”
It is important to acknowledge the impact disability rights legislation has had on accessibility in the US. Public spaces are now required to have a minimum level of accessibility that allows anyone to come into their establishment. Hotels are required to have a minimum quantity of accessible rooms. However, there is a large gap between the minimum required by law and a truly barrier free world. Those hotels may have rooms with wider doors and roll in showers, but the layout of the room makes it challenging to access half the room in a wheelchair. Technically, the hotel meets legal requirements for accessibility, but this is not a truly accessible hotel room.
I experienced an example of this recently in the real world with a disabled family member. We were at a restaurant that had been repurposed from a different business, and it highlighted perfectly what can happen when design is accessible, instead of universal. The accessible parking spots were around the side of the building where there was a wheelchair ramp, with a sign indicating that’s what it was for. The ramp lead into a side door of the building, also marked with the wheelchair symbol. However, there was no curb cut to be able to access the ramp. We had to go around to the front of the building, through the parking lot, where the sidewalk was slanted to the front door, which had no automatic opener. If this family member had been alone, they would then have had to traverse the sidewalk all the way back around the building to the accessible door with an automatic opener. Legally, this restaurant was accessible, but it was the absolute bare minimum and very poorly designed.
Imagine navigating a world that was designed with your existence being an afterthought, something that needed to be accommodated after the fact. Universal Design principles create processes that include many diverse perspectives from the conception of ideas, so as many abilities as possible can be adequately considered when planning. A ramp is something everyone can use, so instead of adding it as an adaptation, entrances should just be step free from the start. It focuses on removing the root cause of inaccessibility, poor design.
The most effectual aspect of Universal Design is that it redefines what good design means, instead of attempting to influence others to design differently. Many efforts at creating and expanding accessibility focus on adapting what was designed and built for able bodied people. Ron Mace himself admitted that his education in design was based on healthy 6-foot males, and no other body type. It is from this narrow basis that infrastructure needed by all is created, thus leading to the need for adaptations. Universal Design expands that basis to include everyone, eliminating the need for costly and inconvenient changes to be made later, or worse, not at all.
The Seven Principles of Universal Design
Ronald Mace and a diverse group of his colleagues worked together to create The Seven Principles of Universal Design. These were published by the Center of Universal Design in 1997. These principles are the guideposts to ensuring places, products, and services are usable as intended by all. You can see more details about each principle at this website https://universaldesign.ie/about-universal-design/the-7-principles
Principle 1: Equitable Use
The design is useful and marketable to people with diverse abilities.
Principle 2: Flexibility in Use
The design accommodates a wide range of individual preferences and abilities.
Principle 3: Simple and Intuitive Use
Use of the design is easy to understand, regardless of the user’s experience, knowledge, language skills, or current concentration level.
Principle 4: Perceptible Information
The design communicates necessary information effectively to the user, regardless of ambient conditions or the user’s sensory abilities.
Principle 5: Tolerance for Error
The design minimizes hazards and the adverse consequences of accidental or unintended actions.
Principle 6: Low Physical Effort
The design can be used efficiently and comfortably and with minimum fatigue.
Principle 7: Size and Space for Approach and Use
Appropriate size and space are provided for approach, reach, manipulation, and use regardless of user’s body size, posture, or mobility.
Benefits for All
We see and use environments designed universally every day. These designs benefit far more than just disabled people. From a person with little to no difficulty, to someone who struggles with most everything, a good design will be usable by both ends of the spectrum. Buttons on screens, for example, the larger they are, the easier they will be to press, and making it larger in no way inhibits the use of the button. This concept is actually taught in web accessibility courses, as well as contrast between information and its background.
A person with perfect vision may be able to read the yellow text on the white background, but it’s likely a strain, even for them. A larger, black text on the same white background would make it easily readable by many more people and limit no one. Adding an audio announcement for blind people would be an additional step to truly Universal Design.
It wasn’t so long ago that seeing a curb cut on a sidewalk was extremely rare, and this severely limited how independent people needing mobility aids could be. Sidewalks today are sloped to meet the road as they enter a crosswalk. Texture, like tactile domes or added ridges will indicate to a blind person that they’re approaching a crosswalk, but they’re not so severe as to stop a wheelchair. Not only do disabled people benefit from this design, but parents using strollers, delivery people using wheeled carts, or people pulling wheeled luggage, all these tasks are made significantly easier by this design.
Fundamental shifts in societal perceptions take time, we see this in the history of Black people in this country, or Suffrage. We’ve made a lot of strides, as a society, in including those seen as "different," in realizing there is significant value in our individuality. We’ve only begun scratching the surface of creating a truly barrier free world, though. Next time you’re in a place you frequent, look around. Imagine how someone in a wheelchair might navigate this space? How would someone with a developmental disorder be treated here? Would a blind person be able to utilize this space effectively? How can you effect change in the environments in which you have influence?
Sources:
Centre for Excellence in Universal Design:
Center for Disability Rights:
Smithsonian National Museum of American History:
RL Mace Universal Design Institute:
Rocky Mountain ADA
Comments