Case Study: ThisAbles

Insight

For those living with disability, regular furniture can be a consistent problem, meaning that for 10% of the world’s population even getting up from a sofa or turning on a light proves challenging. It’s not that specially designed furniture isn’t available, it’s that it’s not affordable - the average piece costing around twice as much, as well as being clinical and crude looking, a constant reminder of being less able-bodied.

“People with disabilities want to buy furniture just like everybody else. They’d like to buy good-looking, affordable products in IKEA but they need them to be a more accessible”, says Eddie Goldenberg, Creative Technology Director at McCann Tel Aviv.

What if furniture could fit around disability rather than highlight it?

Idea

It all started when a Copywriter with cerebral palsy who was working at McCann Tel Aviv brought up the idea of adding something onto his sofa to make it taller, and easier to stand up from.

The team could see that there was a real opportunity in hacking existing products, rather than designing and expecting disabled people to repurchase. So, inspired by this insight and the existing online trend of modifying IKEA products, they set to work. Starting by adding elevated legs to the sofa, IKEA Israel then teamed up with NGOs Milbat and Access Israel to design 13 add-ons for its most popular items, deciding early on that 3D printing was the best solution to share these add-ons with whoever needed them.

Design

Working with the two NGOs gave the team valuable access to research and ensured “close contact with the target audience and their skills and sensitivities”. IKEA also hosted a hackathon in its Tel Aviv store, with specialist help from MILBAT, so that they could get hands-on with their research. Product engineers and people with a variety of disabilities began to experiment with popular pieces in the IKEA catalogue and researched how they could be modified to become more accessible.

After all, if you want a job done properly, you have to do it yourself.

This step was essential in pinpointing problems and design flaws that able-bodied people might not have noticed. For example, delicate little light switches are fiddly for someone with less motor control and bumpers may need to be added to glass cabinets to prevent wheelchair damage - things that might have been taken for granted but seem obvious to those with disabilities.

Production

Convincing a brand to do such an experimental project was, according to the team, one of the hardest parts, particularly as it began as a local movement rather than from global HQ. “Luckily, the client loved the idea but we had to do a lot of quality assurance before launching”, naturally, the success of the project hinged on everything being incredibly well-designed and safe to use. Once things got into the production stage, it was a process of trial and error, where each of the models would have to be tested again and again.

“We wanted to create add-ons that were also cheap to 3D print by not using too much material. We invested time designing a website where you could download the models for free and special how-to videos for each add-on”. “Production and the process before launching the project took around a year and a half. As it is quite an unorthodox project for IKEA, especially since it was initiated by IKEA Israel and not by the global brand (a process which would have taken 4-5 years to start)”.

Results

What started in Israel soon became a worldwide movement. The fact that 3D printing had been built in right from the start ensured that the project could go global, and with an open-source call for feedback and recommendations, the amount of product hacks is growing daily. Not only is furniture that works hard and looks good finally available at an accessible price point, the project highlighted the importance of diversity in the workplace.

When insight and innovation work hand in hand, the everyday can be a little more wonderful for all.