Universal Design 20th Century PDF

Getting a Grip: Disability in American Industrial Design of the Late Twentieth Century Author(s): Bess Williamson Source: Winterthur Portfolio , Vol. 46, No. 4 (Winter 2012), pp. 213-236 Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of the Henry Francis du Pont Winterthur Museum, Inc. Stab...

Getting a Grip: Disability in American Industrial Design of the Late Twentieth Century Author(s): Bess Williamson Source: Winterthur Portfolio , Vol. 46, No. 4 (Winter 2012), pp. 213-236 Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of the Henry Francis du Pont Winterthur Museum, Inc. Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/669668 JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at https://about.jstor.org/terms The University of Chicago Press and Henry Francis du Pont Winterthur Museum, Inc. are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Winterthur Portfolio This content downloaded from 132.174.251.59 on Wed, 15 Jan 2025 14:02:11 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms  Getting a Grip Disability in American Industrial Design of the Late Twentieth Century Bess Williamson From the 1970s to the end of the twentieth century, a number of American designers pursued the approach known as “universal design,” or design that can be used by both disabled and nondisabled people. Universal design informed a number of mainstream products as designers integrated disability-related features into functionally and aesthetically distinct offerings for the mass market. These successful, fashionable consumer goods reflected the ideal that design for people with disabilities could bring about better design for all. In the public image of these products, however, disability was rarely a central focus, but instead remained secondary or hidden. MERICAN INDUSTRIAL designers faced their counterparts in the architectural world, how- A a new challenge beginning in the 1970s: designing appliances, kitchen tools, office equipment, and other devices of work and leisure ever, the designers of consumer products were not subject to legal requirements to improve usability. Instead, a select group of designers took up this new so that they could be used by people with disabilities. functional concern as a creative challenge and a The problem of everyday products and spaces de- source of innovation. Departing from conventional signed without attention to physical, cognitive, and approaches to designing for the most common phys- sensory impairments was a significant issue for a ical types, they considered the extremes of the hu- new and vocal activist group of the period, the man body—the impaired bodies of older people American disability rights movement. The move- and people with disabilities—as a starting point for ment agitated for change on a variety of stages, new designs. In the last several decades of the twen- including nationwide protests in the 1970s to call tieth century, several new, commercially successful attention to the design of sidewalks, government products grew out of the push to design for com- buildings, subways, and other public places.1 Unlike mon, or “universal,” values of greater usability. The approach that came to be known as universal design provides a distinct example among a range Bess Williamson is assistant professor in the Department of Art of late twentieth-century design efforts to address History, Theory, and Criticism at the School of the Art Institute of social issues. Responding to social and cultural Chicago. I gratefully acknowledge the guidance of editor Kasey Grier changes in the 1960s and 1970s, many designers and two anonymous reviewers. This article is based on research at saw such issues as environmental waste, resource the Hagley Museum and Library, with essential input from archivist scarcity in the developing world, urban American Lynn Catanese and financial support of the Henry Belin Du Pont Dissertation Award, and at the Smithsonian National Museum of poverty, and the struggles of the disabled as potential American History, where Katherine Ott provided insight and re- avenues for an enlightened, progressive design prac- search help. Further thanks are due to my advisor, Arwen Mohun, tice.2 These proposals, however, often proved diffi- and colleague Janneken Smucker at the University of Delaware, who read several versions of the work. cult to implement, given the commercial emphasis 1 Joseph P. Shapiro, No Pity: People with Disabilities Forging a New Civil Rights Movement (New York: Times Books, 1993); Richard K. 2 Dean Nieusma, “Alternative Design Scholarship: Working Scotch, From Good Will to Civil Rights: Transforming Federal Disability toward Appropriate Design,” Design Issues 20, no. 3 (Summer Policy, 2nd ed. (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2001). 2004): 13–24; Nigel Whiteley, Design for Society (London: Reaktion, B 2012 by The Henry Francis du Pont Winterthur Museum, 1993); Victor J. Papanek, Design for the Real World: Human Ecology Inc. All rights reserved. 0084-0416/2012/4604-0001$10.00 and Social Change (New York: Pantheon, 1972). This content downloaded from 132.174.251.59 on Wed, 15 Jan 2025 14:02:11 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 214 Winterthur Portfolio 46:4 of the industrial design profession and relative con- farthest ends of the physical spectrum and focusing servatism among manufacturers. By contrast, uni- on an able-bodied norm. When, starting in the versal design deliberately focused on mass-market 1970s, designers noted the potential promise of de- appeal as a means of bringing about social change. signing for atypical or, in Disability Studies terms, The underlying claim of universal design was that “extraordinary” bodies, they acted on new cultural addressing the concerns of people with disabilities understandings of disability.4 At first, these new ap- in everyday products would bring design solutions proaches remained on the margins of design dis- for all—and thus, design solutions that could com- course. A range of designers made first ventures pete successfully in a mass marketplace. This claim into this arena in independent experiments in their paralleled the arguments of the disability rights own offices and in educational projects. In the movement, which posited that the concerns of peo- 1980s and 1990s, however, the strategy of incorpo- ple with disabilities were not marginal, but rather rating features of greater manual and visual usabil- central to a diverse human population with a host ity informed several mass-market, high-profile of potential vulnerabilities. products, including the best-selling Cuisinart food The design historian Judy Attfield describes de- processor and the OXO GoodGrips line of kitchen sign objects as “wild things,” referring to the difficulty tools. This chronology, in which disability moved of finding a tame or “well-ordered” interpretation of from a nonissue, to an experimental challenge, to modern material things as they move through the a commercially viable consideration in industrial wilds of creative planning, manufacturing, market- design, reflects an overall change in American atti- ing, consumption, and use. “To locate design within tudes toward disability. Still, looking deeper, there a social context,” Attfield writes, “means integrating are aspects of “wildness,” in which these artifacts al- objects and processes within a culture of everyday so point to other, unintentional narratives. life where things don’t always do as they are told As this article describes, products of universal nor go according to plan.”3 In the case of the mod- design are artifacts not only of the emergence of ern lives of people with disabilities, there are many disability rights in America, but also of a lasting ways in which designed things do not “do as they are cultural ambivalence toward physical difference told.” Most notably, the vast majority of consumer and difficulty. While these products’ distinctive products are not designed with disability in mind, buttons, handles, and graphics derived from dis- meaning that handles are too delicate, buttons too ability research, their marketing made little to stiff, and graphics too small for certain users. Even no reference to inability or impairment. Universal in architecture, where laws have improved the land- design’s emphasis on the benefits of products for scape somewhat, blocked doors, out-of-order eleva- “all users” often led to images and coverage that tors, and poorly designed ramps show how even elided or even eliminated any actual persons with legal mandates do not guarantee that material disabilities. As a result, a consumer might easily ap- things will work “according to plan.” Universal de- preciate the functional and stylistic qualities of sign represents a deliberate effort on the part of de- these products without being aware of their design signers to address the ways things can go wrong for derivation—never questioning the premise that hand, eye, and body. These plans, in turn, created disability is a special or extraordinary experience. new questions and avenues of interpretation as they Recent observers have offered other possible ap- reached material form. proaches, seeking once again to revise material ap- The history and development of universal de- proaches to disability. Ongoing debates about the sign show the variety of ways that material objects possibilities of designing for a variety of bodies respond to, and in turn shape, social contexts. At show the elusiveness of a tame, ordered response first look, universal design represents a victory of to new ideals and ideas in design. disability rights principles, as designers moved be- yond assumptions of disability as a special and sep- arate experience toward accepting the relevance of The Human Factor disability to usability in general. Before this mo- ment, ergonomic or body-focused design sought Universal design initiated a new phase in a longer an ideal, typical body size and shape as a guide history of designers, planners, and engineers working for designing spaces and products, leaving out the 4 Rosemarie Garland Thomson, Extraordinary Bodies: Figuring Phys- 3 Judy Attfield, Wild Things: The Material Culture of Everyday Life ical Disability in American Culture and Literature (New York: Columbia (Oxford: Berg, 2000), 6. University Press, 1997). This content downloaded from 132.174.251.59 on Wed, 15 Jan 2025 14:02:11 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Getting a Grip 215 to improve the fit between manufactured things and specialists and social workers recommended similar the human body. Over the course of the twentieth arrangements, suggesting that disabled individuals century, experts in these various fields recognized a be trained for specific kinds of jobs—watch repair, fundamental challenge of mass production: that for example—in which they could easily adapt a while standardized manufacturing could churn out small workshop to their individual concerns.9 After identical machines and tools, human bodies proved Frank Gilbreth’s death in 1924, Lillian worked with more difficult to predict. Before the 1970s and the rehabilitation hospitals to develop specialized train- advent of universal design, disabilities rarely fea- ing kitchens to extend the same lessons to the labors tured in the calculations of designers. When these of housework.10 For women who used wheelchairs professionals did turn to people with limited reach, or prosthetic limbs or who had heart or orthopedic dexterity, mobility, or sight, they tended to respond conditions, easy-to-reach shelving and other tools to the thinking of their time, treating the disabled could help them “use [their] time and energy to ad- as marginal figures, exceptions to the “norm.” These vantage” in their home duties.11 While these design assumptions shaped the technical processes by which scenarios remained limited to customized projects spaces and products were designed and ultimately and adaptations, they nonetheless acknowledged created the “inaccessible” society that disability rights the presence of people with disabilities in work- advocates would critique in the later part of the places and homes and their material needs in these century. spaces. A starting point for the history of body-focused During World War II, a new field of “human design can be found in the early twentieth century. factors” or “ergonomic” design honed in on the Progressive Era experts in “scientific management” problem of designing military equipment for a created a new form of industrial consulting focused range of bodies. Looking at military equipment on the interactions between industrial equipment such as planes and submarines, they saw buttons and human operators. For leading figures including that were hard to reach and distinguish, cramped Frederick W. Taylor and Frank and Lillian Gilbreth, seating, controls out of reach or at awkward angles, proper selection and training of workers were key and loose clothing at risk of catching on levers and tools for eliminating wastes of time and energy on doors. In military research laboratories, interdisci- the factory floor and, eventually, in homes as well.5 plinary teams of doctors, biologists, psychologists, Taylor suggested screening workers according to anthropologists, and engineers mined medical data body type, essentially designing a workforce to fit for use in design, using these “anthropometrics” the physical requirements of certain machines and (human body measurements) to determine designs tools.6 The Gilbreths, for their part, advised that of equipment ranging from cockpits to control panels there was a “one best way” to do any task and focused to uniforms.12 on both training and equipment design as a means Anthropometric methods developed in World of achieving it.7 War II remained standard in design for decades after In rare moments when these early twentieth- the war. Statistical research showed that the greatest century consultants considered disability as a factor variation in physical dimensions occurred at the very in industrial work, they imagined customized solu- ends of the anthropometric scale—among the highest tions to adapt mass-produced work equipment. The Gilbreths were some of the first to address the con- 9 cerns of disabled workers through design. They Edna Yost, Normal Lives for the Disabled (New York: Macmillan, 1944), 7–8; S. Harry Berns, Edward W. Lowman, Howard A. Rusk, studied veterans of World War I who had lost arms and Donald A. Covalt, Spinal Cord Injury: Rehabilitation Costs and and recommended adapting office and factory equip- Results in 31 Successive Cases including a Follow-up Study (New York: ment to accommodate their disabilities.8 Medical Institute of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, New York University– Bellevue Medical Center, 1957), 12. 5 10 Lancaster, Making Time, 334; Yost, Normal Lives for the Disabled. David Meister, The History of Human Factors and Ergonomics 11 Lillian Gilbreth, “Building for Living,” in A Nationwide Report (London: Erlbaum, 1999), 151–52. 6 on Building Happy, Useful Lives for the Handicapped: A Record of the Frederick Winslow Taylor, The Principles of Scientific Manage- 1950 Convention (Chicago: National Society for Crippled Children ment (New York: Harper, 1919). and Adults, 1951), 48–50. 7 Jane Lancaster, Making Time: Lillian Moller Gilbreth; A Life beyond 12 Meister, History of Human Factors and Ergonomics, 147–52; “Cheaper by the Dozen” (Boston: Northeastern University Press, 2004). Ross Armstrong McFarland, Human Factors in Air Transport Design 8 Elspeth Brown, “The Prosthetics of Management: Time Mo- (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1946); Charles Mauro, “Human Factor: tion Study, Photography, and the Industrialized Body in World How Human Variability Affects Design,” Industrial Design 25 ( January War I America,” in Artificial Parts, Practical Lives: Modern Histories 1978); Leonard C. Mead and Joseph W. Wulfeck, “Human Engineer- of Prosthetics, ed. Katherine Ott, David Serlin, and Stephen Mihm ing: The Study of the Human Factor in Machine Design,” Scientific (New York: New York University Press, 2002), 249–81. Monthly 75, no. 6 (December 1952): 372–79. This content downloaded from 132.174.251.59 on Wed, 15 Jan 2025 14:02:11 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 216 Winterthur Portfolio 46:4 and lowest two to five percentiles.13 Researchers cal- design, consulting with former Navy statistician culated that, by eliminating these statistical outliers, Alvin Tilley.18 In 1959, Dreyfuss published a collec- they could develop designs that could accommodate tion of the charts called The Measure of Man, a pack- the remaining 95 percent of potential operators— age that included two wall-sized posters of male and tall, short, slender, broad, and with a range of reach female figures along with thirty-two smaller charts ability—without sacrificing weight or size. While showing them in a variety of design contexts, in- their numbers were limited to the young, able-bodied cluding standing at a control board, sitting at a population of active-duty military, these engineers desk, driving a car, and in the passenger seat of an did pursue some measures of diversity in their sam- airplane (figs. 1–2).19 The charts in The Measure of ples, including servicemen of a variety of specialties Man guided designers through the practice of de- as well as women enrolled in the Women Army Ser- signing for the middle 95 percent range of docu- vice Pilot (WASP) and Flight Nurse programs.14 Given mented body types, providing three measurements the military context, however, these early ergonomists (2.5, 50, and 97.5 percentiles) for each anthropom- had the option to eliminate certain body types from etry point. Acknowledging that no single design certain positions if fit was too difficult to achieve. could be perfect for all users, the book offered “It is better to require that the 98th percentile these small, average, and large measurements with man hunch down to the 90 per cent cockpit or even the ideal that designers could “strike a balance that to bar him from the fighter type aircraft,” wrote one provides all three with reasonable fit.”20 The charts researcher, than to include head and foot space for became standard reference works for American de- his edge-of-the-spectrum body size.15 sign offices, seeming to provide exact measurements As the war came to an end, human factors spe- for every design situation.21 cialists applied their “95 percent” principle to the For the Dreyfuss office and other industrial de- design of civilian products and environments. signers who used The Measure of Man, people with Where once they discussed the extremes of flight disabilities were literally off the charts, not repre- conditions, now these engineers and industrial con- sented in the 95 percentile median or even in the sultants emphasized the importance of fit and com- full 100 percent of data sets.22 When Dreyfuss and fort to the efficient operation of any kind of his contemporaries did encounter people with equipment—in industry, in offices, or at home.16 disabilities, they had to conduct new research to fill The leading disseminator of human factors methods in data not provided in standard guides. In 1954, to the industrial design field was Henry Dreyfuss, a the Dreyfuss Office contributed to a Veterans prolific American designer of products and interiors Administration–funded project to improve prosthetic (e.g., the John Deere tractor and black Bell Tele- arms for veterans who had lost limbs in World War II phone).17 After a stint designing naval equipment and the Korean War.23 Dreyfuss’s staff initially ap- during the war, Dreyfuss developed a series of an- proached the project by strapping prosthetic limbs thropometric charts for his office’s use in civilian 18 Henry Dreyfuss, Designing for People (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1955). 13 H. T. E. Hertzberg, “Some Contributions of Applied Phys- 19 Henry Dreyfuss, The Measure of Man: Human Factors in Design ical Anthropology to Human Engineering,” Annals of the New York (New York: Whitney Library of Design, 1960). Academy of Sciences 63 (1955): 620–22; Albert Damon, Howard W. 20 Ibid., 4–5. Stoudt, and Ross A. McFarland, The Human Body in Equipment De- 21 In surveys, designers cite Dreyfuss as one of the most often sign (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1966), 3. consulted ergonomic sources. John V. H. Bonner, “Exploring the 14 Francis E. Randall, Albert Damon, Robert S. Benton, and Interface Culture between Ergonomics and Product Interface Donald I. Patt, “Human Body Size in Military Aircraft and Personal Design,” in Design Cultures, Proceedings of the Third European Equipment,” Army Air Forces Technical Report no. 5501, Army Academy of Design Conference (Sheffield: European Academy Air Forces Air Material Command, Dayton, OH, 1946. of Design, 1999). A small selection of works that cite the Dreyfuss 15 Hertzberg, “Some Contributions of Applied Physical An- office’s technical guides include: Harry A. King, “Body pillow,” US thropology,” 620. Patent 4,754,510, filed March 6, 1986, issued July 5, 1988; 16 For example, McFarland, Human Factors in Air Transport Design; Michael E. Wiklund and Stephen B. Wilcox, Designing Usability Ross Armstrong McFarland, Human Body Size and Capabilities in the Design into Medical Products (Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press, 2005), 77; Teresa and Operation of Vehicular Equipment (Boston: Harvard School of Public Bellingar, Pete Beyer, and Larry Wilkerson, “The Research behind Health, 1953); Ross Armstrong McFarland and Alfred L. Moseley, Hu- Zody,” white paper (Haworth Ergonomics, Holland, MI, May man Factors in Highway Transport Safety (Boston: Harvard School of Pub- 2009), 5. lic Health, 1954); Damon, Stoudt, and McFarland, The Human Body in 22 The National Health Examination of 1960–62 made available Equipment Design; Earnest Albert Hooton, A Survey in Seating (Cambridge, a more racially, geographically, and socioeconomically diverse popu- MA: Department of Anthropology, Harvard University, 1945). lation, with subjects between the ages of 18 and 89. Damon, Stoudt, 17 Russell Flinchum, Henry Dreyfuss, Industrial Designer: The Man in and McFarland, The Human Body in Equipment Design, 10–11, 53. 23 the Brown Suit (New York: Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, David Harley Serlin, Replaceable You: Engineering the Body Smithsonian Institution, Rizzoli, 1997), 87–88, 175–79. in Postwar America (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004), This content downloaded from 132.174.251.59 on Wed, 15 Jan 2025 14:02:11 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Getting a Grip 217 Fig. 1. Henry Dreyfuss, Standing Adult Male chart, 1960. From Henry Dreyfuss, The Measure of Man (New York: Whitney Library of Design, 1960). (Henry Dreyfuss Associates, LLC.) on their own bodies, but this proved unsatisfactory— Army-issue “dual-hook” prostheses. For Dreyfuss and “such is the taken-for-granted magic of sound arms his staff, design for people with disabilities was a spe- and legs that they were unable to use these mechan- cial side project involving issues that were unique to ical devices,” wrote Dreyfuss. For a better test group, that group. he brought in several amputee veterans to demon- Occasionally, a designer’s foray into developing strate how they used their arms, stripping off their products for injured or disabled bodies led to suc- shirts so that the designers could observe “how they cess in the world of mass-market design. Like many co-ordinated their muscles to operate the steel sub- of his contemporaries, the commercial illustrator stitutes.”24 The designers responded with a prototype Thomas Lamb felt a desire to participate in the war that complemented the amputees’ demonstrated effort in the 1940s. Lamb never worked for the War skills, improving the weight distribution in standard Department or any branch of the armed forces but instead worked independently to develop a new crutch for injured veterans who would be returning 34–50; Katherine Ott, “The Sum of Its Parts: An Introduction to Modern Histories of Prosthetics,” in Ott, Serlin, and Mihm, Artificial from the front.25 Through research into modern Parts, Practical Lives, 16–17; Bess Furman, Progress in Prosthetics: A Summary under Sponsorship of the Prosthetics Research Board of the National Academy of Sciences (Washington, DC: Department of Health, 25 Rachel Elizabeth Delphia, “Design to Enable the Body: Thomas Education and Welfare, Office of Vocational Rehabilitation, 1962). Lamb’s ‘Wedge-Lock’ Handle, 1941–1962” (MA thesis, University of 24 Dreyfuss, Designing for People, 27. Delaware, 2005). This content downloaded from 132.174.251.59 on Wed, 15 Jan 2025 14:02:11 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 218 Winterthur Portfolio 46:4 Fig. 3. Thomas Lamb, Lim-Rest crutches. (Thomas Lamb Fig. 2. Henry Dreyfuss, Adult Male Driver in Vehicle Papers, Hagley Museum and Library.) chart, 1960. From Henry Dreyfuss, The Measure of Man (New York: Whitney Library of Design, 1960). (Henry Dreyfuss Associates, LLC.) patented “Wedge-Lock” design incorporated angled incisions with convex curves.28 These V-shaped cuts, Lamb posited, guided the hand to the correct position rehabilitation medicine, he learned that standard to make use of the thumb—the strongest finger—and crutches could cause arm pain when users put their reduce strain in the outer edge of the hand.29 full body weight on their armpits; in response, he Thomas Lamb’s interest in wounded soldiers in- proposed a crutch with an improved, comfortable formed his new patent but had little to do with the grip that would encourage users to lean more weight final uses of the handles. Despite repeated at- on their hands (fig. 3).26 Although he did not explic- tempts, at great personal cost, to court the medical itly calculate a 95 percentile range of hands, Lamb supply industry, Lamb only found success with his studied anatomy books and measured hundreds of crutch handles once they were attached to main- hands to devise a handle that would fit a range of stream consumer products.30 Cutco Knives licensed sizes, as well as left- and right-handed users.27 Rather Lamb’s Wedge-Lock handle starting in 1952, and than a “one to one” grip form—such as one made his designs remain standard on the popular knives from squeezing a coil of clay in the hand—Lamb’s (fig. 4).31 He also adapted the handle with slight 26 George Deaver and Mary Eleanor Brown, “The Challenge of 28 Rachel Delphia, “Ergonomics and Negative Space: Thomas Lamb’s Wedge-Lock Handle,” in The Utility of Emptiness, ed. Uli Crutches: VI. Living with Crutches and Canes,” Archives of Physical Marchsteiner (Barcelona: Museu de les Arts Decoratives, 2008), 45. Medicine, November 1946, 683–706; Thomas Lamb to Mary Eleanor 29 Brown, February 20, 1950, and Mary Eleanor Brown to Thomas Lamb, Thomas Lamb, sketches and notes, Thomas Lamb Papers, April 13, 1950, Thomas Lamb Papers, Hagley Museum and Library, Hagley Museum and Library. Wilmington, DE. 30 Lamb to Brown, February 20, 1950; Brown to Lamb, April 13, 27 Wedge-Lock handle sketches folder, ca. 1940s, Thomas Lamb 1950; Thomas Lamb to Frances L. Orbeck, July 1, 1957, Thomas Papers, Hagley Museum and Library, Wilmington, DE; Anthony Staros, Lamb Papers, Hagley Museum and Library; Howard Rusk, Self-Help “Evaluation Report C-4/1: Lamb Crutch Handle,” Scientific Handle Com- Devices for Rehabilitation (New York: Institute of Physical Medicine pany, June 4, 1952, Thomas Lamb Papers, Hagley Museum and Library; and Rehabilitation, 1945). “Tom Lamb The Handle Man,” Industrial Design 1 (February 1954). 31 Delphia, “Design to Enable the Body,” 62. This content downloaded from 132.174.251.59 on Wed, 15 Jan 2025 14:02:11 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Getting a Grip 219 variations to provide optimal grips for luggage, bi- certain range of motion in the hand to begin with. cycle handlebars, brooms, saws, pens, and cookware.32 As Lamb’s wife wrote of the crutch handle, “the ob- Although Lamb denied any aesthetic considerations jects are making the hands perform, rather than in his design of the handle forms, the Wedge-Lock the hands making the objects perform.”36 has a distinctive, recognizable shape. Companies For people with disabilities living in the 1950s that licensed the Lamb handle promoted them and and 1960s, the mainstream world of products Lamb’s design story as key characteristics of the and architecture remained difficult to use. Some products. Cutco described its knives as the “world’s specialists within the field of medical rehabilitation greatest cutlery” that combined a patented “Double observed this problem and sought to address it, but D grind” blade and the “exclusive Lamb handle.”33 they, too, failed to see a role for these issues in In promotional materials, the producers of Wear- mainstream design and marketing. In rehabilita- Ever Aluminum cookware described the full story tion clinics and hospitals, occupational and physi- of how Lamb “became handle conscious during the cal therapists designed specialized tools dubbed war, while designing a pain-saving crutch … [and] “self-help aids” for their patients to use in the typi- invented the wedging principle which became the cal inaccessible environments of the postwar home. basis for this revolutionary new utensil handle.”34 In At Dr. Howard Rusk’s New York Institute for Phys- the Wedge-Lock handle, Lamb had translated re- ical Medicine and Rehabilitation, a leading center search on the injured body into benefits for a com- established in 1948, a patient might learn to attach mercial market—a result that foreshadowed the a leather strap to an electric razor or solder an ex- development of universal design strategies later in tended loop onto cutlery as part of training for in- the century—but never produced a crutch or any dependent living outside of the hospital.37 Rusk other medically related handle. wrote of the dearth of available products for this Lamb and Dreyfuss both represent designers’ training and reported that many former patients responses to disability in an era before a rights and their families, as well as independent inven- movement, when the argument for universal de- tors, sent him ideas and plans for products of this sign had not yet taken hold. These midcentury de- kind. He cautioned, though, that their market via- signers responded to what disability rights advocates bility might be limited: “While there is a great need would later describe as the “disabling’’ effects of for this type of equipment … still, the problems are design, or the ways in which design can obstruct so individual that too often a universal type of de- movement, cause pain, or confuse the user.35 In vice is not suitable for everyone.”38 Rusk’s medical both cases, people with disabilities ultimately re- perspective, like the “special” research projects of mained outside of the imagined mainstream of product designers, reflects a society-wide percep- users. In Dreyfuss’s case, he touted his work with tion of people with disabilities as outsiders to main- amputees as a part of the practice of “designing for stream commercial culture and design. In contrast people,” but he admitted that the prosthetic arm to this view, designers who embraced disability as project required him to go beyond his knowledge an area of research in succeeding decades found of the “typical” user. Thomas Lamb developed his in- that there was indeed a possibility for universal de- novative handles based on research on the particular vices to be marketed to a broader population. issues of injured veterans, but the resulting form targeted a part of the user’s body that was not injured. The carefully sculpted grips, through which Lamb Discovering Disability aimed to optimize the strongest fingers, assumed a Consumer product designers began to reconsider standard ergonomic approaches in the 1970s, re- 32 “Cutco: World’s Finest Cutlery,” advertisement, Cutco Cutlery, Olean, NY, n.d., Thomas Lamb Papers, Hagley Museum and Library; sponding to a growing, more active population of “Presenting the New, Advanced Wear-Ever Aluminum New Method people with disabilities in America. With advances Utensil Design,” advertisement, Wear-Ever, New Kensington, PA, n.d., Thomas Lamb Papers, Hagley Museum and Library. 33 “Cutco: World’s Finest Cutlery.” 36 Carolyn Lamb, “The Story of the Lamb Lim-Rest” [after 1944], 34 “Presenting the New, Advanced Wear-Ever Aluminum New Thomas Lamb Papers, Hagley Museum and Library. Method Utensil Design.” 37 Robert G. Wilson, “Need for and Development of Aids for 35 Edward N. Brandt and Andrew MacPherson Pope, eds., En- Handicapped People” (MS thesis, Illinois Institute of Technology, abling America: Assessing the Role of Rehabilitation Science and Engineering 1952), 16; “Self-Help Devices,” IPMR: A Chronicle of Independence, (Washington, DC: National Academy Press, 1997), 3; Joseph La Rocca 1972, 12–13; Howard A. Rusk and Eugene J. Taylor, Living with and Jerry S. Turem, The Application of Technological Developments to Phys- a Disability (Garden City, NY: Blakiston, 1953). ically Disabled People (Washington, DC: Urban Institute, 1978), 1. 38 Rusk and Taylor, Living with a Disability, 20. This content downloaded from 132.174.251.59 on Wed, 15 Jan 2025 14:02:11 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 220 Winterthur Portfolio 46:4 Fig. 4. Cutco Knife Company, “Cutco: World’s Finest Cutlery.” (Thomas Lamb Papers, Hagley Museum and Library.) in surgical techniques and technologies such as These groups lobbied for local accessibility regula- the “iron lung” respirator, people with significant tions and in 1977 staged nationwide protests to physical disabilities were increasingly likely to live pressure the federal government to pass and en- long and active lives in the mid- to late twentieth force sweeping regulations for public buildings century.39 Drawing inspiration from the civil rights and transportation design.41 While designers like and second-wave feminist movements of the time, Henry Dreyfuss and Thomas Lamb responded to a new disability rights movement emerged in the a postwar flash of publicity around disabled vet- late 1960s and early 1970s, coalescing around erans, the next generation experimenting with social service organizations and veterans’ groups.40 universal design responded to a new awareness of disability not as a special separate concern, but 39 Brandt and Pope, Enabling America, 1–31; Edward D. Berkowitz, one that had relevance to a broader public. Their “The Federal Government and the Emergence of Rehabilitation Medicine,” Historian 43, no. 4 (Winter 1981): 530–45; Ott, “The Sum of Its Parts,” 15–18. 41 “Facilities for the Elderly and Handicapped,” Bay Area Rapid 40 Shapiro, No Pity; Paul K. Longmore, “The Disability Rights Transit District, San Francisco, January 1975, Harold L. Willson Papers, Movement: Activism in the 1970s and Beyond,” in Why I Burned Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley; Charles D. Goldman, My Book and Other Essays on Disability (Philadelphia: Temple Uni- “Architectural Barriers: A Perspective on Progress,” Western New England versity Press, 2003), 102–18. Law Review 5 (1983): 465–93. This content downloaded from 132.174.251.59 on Wed, 15 Jan 2025 14:02:11 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Getting a Grip 221 early responses included experiments in process from earlier human factors charts based on a select and form to address the entirety of human users, anthropometric spectrum (figs. 5–6).45 In place of not just the estimated “95 percent” median. the representative figures in Measure of Man was a se- In the 1970s, a number of designers and engi- verely abstracted human form tagged with physical neers proposed new technical models to address limitations, from “Difficulty interpreting informa- a more diverse user group than were represented tion” at the head to “Inability to use lower extremi- in midcentury anthropometric calculations. Henry ties” and “Extremes of height and weight” at the Dreyfuss’s office published a revised edition of The foot. In accompanying charts, Faste connected these Measure of Man in 1974, now retitled Humanscale, functional characteristics to design recommenda- including a set of charts with measurements for tions. His lines linked particular impairments to persons in wheelchairs, using canes and crutches, and design features, such as light-touch controls and en- with limited vision and reach.42 Dreyfuss’s protégés larged knobs. His charts emphasized the overlaps admitted that adding these new groups into the pool among impairments, showing, for example, that dif- of potential users made for a more difficult project ficulties in comprehension, sight, and mobility all cor- of accommodating diverse bodies. They acknowl- responded to design strategies for hand controls and edged the problems of using the median measure- buttons. Describing his charts in 1977, Faste echoed ments but found that “to include the extremes—the the idea of a “handicapped majority” as he noted that, very large and small people—is also impractical, for through study of manual disabilities, “it becomes it is nearly impossible to cover this range in a single quite apparent how much contortion the normal design without jeopardizing the comfort, efficiency, hand must go through to accommodate itself to or safety of the majority.”43 An article published in the form of a product.”46 In focusing on limitations, Industrial Design in the same year, however, suggested rather than a “typical” 95 percent of bodily dimen- a different conclusion. In May 1974, the magazine sions, “The Enabler” sought design improvements ran a twenty-page feature article titled “The Hand- that could potentially improve function for all users. icapped Majority,” suggesting the commonality of Many designers made first forays into addressing “handicapping” design interactions, not their spe- disability in educational and experimental projects cialness. The article featured photographs of people in the 1970s. In 1975, the Industrial Designers Society struggling to open familiar products and packaging: of America reported that 51 percent of departments fumbling with a milk carton, tearing with their included at least one project to design for users with hands and teeth at a cracker box, and struggling to disabilities during a student’s career.47 Some of these pry open blister-packs and pop-tops. The article projects explicitly set out to revise existing approaches argued that these functional obstacles affected a to design for the disabled. In 1974, the Armco Steel broad swath (a “majority”) of the population. One Corporation sponsored a series of workshops on designer noted that “a ‘normal’ person is [also] liable “Designing to Accommodate the Handicapped,” to fall on a polished floor, slip in the bath, or trip over presenting the topic as an area of forward-thinking a threshold … he has limitations of reach, and can and experimental design.48 Students argued that only see over a limited distance.” Student partici- addressing this population did not necessarily hinder pants in a workshop on disability asked, “How many creativity and innovation. Participants developed proto- Americans are really normal?”44 types with easy hand-holds and simple interfaces, with The premise of the Industrial Design article—that soft angles, large buttons, and snap-in elements in the design concerns of the disabled had relevance to products including a wall-mounted emergency kit, a the broader field of users—echoed through a number television set, and a lever-shaped doorknob with an of design forays of the period. Rolf Faste, a design professor at Syracuse University, developed a new 45 Rolf Faste, “Design with Disabled Persons in Mind,” typescript, chart linking parts of the body to design features. This Syracuse University School of Architecture, ca. 1977, Richard Hollerith chart, called “The Enabler,” differed in look and logic Papers, Hagley Museum and Library; Rolf Faste, “New System Propels Design for the Handicapped,” Industrial Design 24 ( July 1977). 46 Richard Hollerith, “Make Everyday Products More Usable 42 Niels Diffrient, Alvin R. Tilly, and Joan C. Bardagjy, Human- for Those with Disabilities,” in Human Factors and Industrial Design scale 1/2/3: A Portfolio of Information, 1. Sizes of People, 2. Seating Consid- in Consumer Products (Medford, MA: Tufts University, 1980), 93. erations, 3. Requirements for the Handicapped and Elderly (Cambridge, 47 Government Affairs Committee, “1975 Survey of Industrial MA: MIT Press, 1974); Niels Diffrient and Henry Dreyfuss Associates, Design Educational Institutions and Educators of Awareness of the Humanscale 4/5/6: Manual (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1981), and Problems of Handicapped and Aging,” Industrial Designers Society Humanscale 7/8/9: Manual (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1981). of America, 1975, Richard Hollerith Papers, Hagley Library. 43 Diffrient, Tilly, and Bardagjy, Humanscale 1/2/3, 4–5. 48 Designing to Accommodate the Handicapped: 1974 Armco Student 44 “The Handicapped Majority,” Industrial Design 21 (May 1974): 25. Design Program (Middletown, OH: Armco Steel Corporation, 1974). This content downloaded from 132.174.251.59 on Wed, 15 Jan 2025 14:02:11 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 222 Winterthur Portfolio 46:4 object of hostility or resistance—it was just that she didn’t count.”49 Dressed up, she saw with fresh eyes the problems of delicate switches and buttons, confusing technologies, and fast-paced, crowded urban spaces. Like Faste, Moore articulated the idea that designing for the few (older people) could have broader implications: “By designing with the needs of older consumers in mind,” she wrote, “we will find that the inevitable result is better products for all of us.”50 These various projects that explored disability in design appeared independently in the 1970s, with little awareness of each other and no common term to describe their ethos. The term universal design can be traced to this time period as well, although it was not widely recognized for another decade. Ron Mace, a North Carolina architect who used a wheelchair after a childhood case of polio, coined the term in the early 1970s.51 Mace and his collab- orators defined universal design as “simply designing all products, buildings, and exterior spaces to be us- able by all people to the greatest extent possible.”52 The term encapsulated the idea that many had as- serted over the years: that design for people with disabilities was not a separate chore apart from gen- eral design concerns, but instead could contribute to improved function for all.53 The term also challenged assumptions, particularly prevalent in architectural design, that accessible or “barrier-free” design was ugly and a burden imposed by government.54 If “barrier- Fig. 5. Rolf Faste, The Enabler, 1977. From Rolf Faste, free” and “design for the handicapped” sounded like “New System Propels Design for the Handicapped,” In- boring technical requirements, “universal” suggested dustrial Design, July 1977, 51. (Rolf Faste Foundation for a new idea and a creative challenge.55 Design Creativity.) oversized key (figs. 7–8). Photographs of the proj- 49 Pat Moore and Charles Paul Conn, Disguised: A True Story (Waco, ect showed these items as aesthetically inviting, TX: Word Books, 1985), 39–40. following design conventions of electronics and 50 Ibid., 163. home décor rather than a medical or institutional 51 Ronald Mace, “Universal Design: Barrier Free Environments appearance. for Everyone,” Designers West, November 1985; Moore and Conn, Disguised; “The Ronald L. Mace Collection,” Special Collections In another venture, a young designer named Department, North Carolina State University, 1999. Patricia Moore used a hands-on research method 52 See http://www.design.ncsu.edu/cud/about_ud/about_ud.htm. to explore issues of design for the elderly. In 1978, 53 Katherine Ott, interview with Ruth Lusher , typescript, Moore took leave from the prominent New York Division of Medicine and Science, National Museum of American History, Washington, DC; Elaine Ostroff and Daniel Iacofano, Teach- design firm of Raymond Loewy and immersed ing Design for All People: The State of the Art (Boston: Adaptive Environ- herself in the issue by dressing in theatrical makeup ments Center, 1982); Wolfgang F. E. Preiser and Elaine Ostroff, eds., and costumes to pass as a woman in her eighties. Universal Design Handbook (New York: McGraw-Hill, 2001). My thanks to Katherine Ott, who has interviewed and collected documents to In her book Disguised—part memoir, part design trace the many design professionals who participated in universal de- manifesto—she reported that while people were sign, particularly Mace’s collaborators. willing to carry her bags or open doors, she felt ir- 54 Mace, “Universal Design,” 18. relevant to the culture of consumption and design 55 Mary E. Osman, “Barrier-Free Architecture: Yesterday’s Spe- as an older person. Attending a design conference cial Design Becomes Tomorrow’s Standard,” AIA Journal 63, no. 3 (March 1975): 40–44; Michelle Morgan, “Beyond Disability: A in costume, Moore noted that “an old lady of eighty- Broader Definition of Architectural Barriers,” AIA Journal 65, five was someone to be ignored. She was not the no. 5 (May 1976): 50–53. This content downloaded from 132.174.251.59 on Wed, 15 Jan 2025 14:02:11 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Getting a Grip 223 Fig. 6. Rolf Faste, Controls, 1977. From Rolf Faste, “New System Propels Design for the Handi- capped,” Industrial Design, July 1977, 53. (Rolf Faste Foundation for Design Creativity.) For most of the 1970s, designers’ efforts to ad- dress disability in new and appealing ways re- mained experimental, reflected in design charts, product prototypes, and exploratory pieces like Pattie Moore’s undercover research. In the 1980s and 1990s, several product designers put these initial ideas to work, creating mass-market products with functional and visual elements that responded to limitations of the body. While these products reflect changes in design approaches to disability, however, their marketing messages show a more complex story. As the next section will show, the earliest mass-market products that incorporated disability-related features made little or no reference to disability or physical im- pairment in media or marketing materials. In contrast to early environmental products pitched to an “eco- conscious” market, the consumer products that incor- porated research on physical disabilities rarely touted these particular benefits. Instead of creating a new niche market of those who identified as disabled, uni- versal design translated these concerns into overall marketing appeals based on function and aesthetics. Universal Design on the Market The products that emerged from a universal de- sign approach had certain characteristics in com- mon. They were generally functional hand tools, Fig. 7. Television prototype, 1974. From Designing to Ac- they fell into the category of kitchen and home commodate the Handicapped: 1974 Armco Student Design wares, and they shared a certain aesthetic, with Program (Middletown, OH: Armco Steel Corporation, smooth surfaces, tactile controls or handles, and 1974). (AK Steel.) This content downloaded from 132.174.251.59 on Wed, 15 Jan 2025 14:02:11 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 224 Winterthur Portfolio 46:4 new Cuisinart food processor became an icon of 1980s housewares design and a status symbol for gourmet chefs and cosmopolitan consumers.59 The cream-colored plastic monolith and sans-serif block lettering that Harrison chose for the Cuisinart nods to his training in modernist, unadorned form, but it also reflected research into disabilities (fig. 9).60 The Cuisinart is an assemblage of basic three-dimensional forms: a cylinder atop a solid block. It resembled high-design lines from brands like Braun and Alessi; one commentator placed it among several American designs that mimicked “sleek imported goods” to appeal to “status-conscious upwardly mobile” con- Fig. 8. Door handle prototype, 1974. From Designing to Accom- sumers with “Europeanized tastes.”61 These consum- modate the Handicapped: 1974 Armco Student Design Program ers would not, however, likely identify the features (Middletown, OH: Armco Steel Corporation, 1974). (AK Steel.) that related to more than a decade of research into design for disabilities, gained through Harrison’s contrasting, sometimes brightly colored graphics. teaching at RISD. Harrison won a federal grant Another significant commonality is that they were in 1965 to fund student collaborations on rehabilita- marketed to a general, mainstream market with lit- tion equipment and introduced disability into many tle to no mention of disability in advertising or student projects, such as a demonstration house for brand names. While their designers all drew on the International Lead Zinc Research Organization awareness of disabilities—often related to the per- designed and built between 1970 and 1977.62 In sonal experiences of friends and loved ones—they the house, students included flat thresholds for deliberately presented the products as useful and wheelchair access; large, lever-shaped faucets; door appealing to a broad potential audience. Honing handles easily used by people with manual disabilities; the forms and graphics of these products to move and light switches and outlets at reachable heights easily through the hands or communicate clearly to (figs. 10–11; note the original design model of the the eyes, these industrial designers implicitly en- Cuisinart in the kitchen photograph). These basic dorsed the concept of a “handicapped majority” elements translated an understanding of manual and the benefits of these design improvements to all. and mobility impairment into smooth, simple forms The first mass-market product that integrated that would be difficult to distinguish from other de- “universal” features was the 1978 Cuisinart food signer housewares of the period. processor, a new design for a top-selling appliance. Harrison drew on the knowledge he had gained The company Cuisinarts first introduced their food through teaching in his private work for Cuisinarts, processors in 1973 as a licensed reproduction of shaping specific design features to improve usability. the French Robo-Coupe “Magi-Mix,” a professional- In preliminary sketches for the food processor, he grade mixer with a sharp, rotating blade that explored variations on large, simplified controls, turned within a cylindrical plastic chamber.56 The such as a bar-shaped lever and a round dial control French-sounding Cuisinart stood out in a market of (figs. 12–13). Harrison explained his design approach lower powered blenders and reported strong sales even at its relatively high price point.57 Its popularity 59 “The Food Processor Revolution: Act II,” New York, November 13, brought competition, with at least a dozen similarly 1978, 78. shaped imitators by 1978.58 The company hired Marc 60 Harrison studied at the Pratt Institute and Cranbrook School of Harrison, a professor at the Rhode Island School of Art, two bastions of American modernism in the 1950s. He counted among his influences Rowena Reed Kostellow, who installed a Design (RISD), for an update to help distinguish their Bauhaus-inspired design curriculum at Pratt. Marc Harrison, cur- product. Rolled out in 1978 as the “DLC-7,” the riculum vitae , ser. I, box 8, Marc Harrison Papers, Hagley Museum and Library; Gail Greet Hannah, Elements of Design: Rowena Reed Kostellow and the Structure of Visual Relationships (Princeton, NJ: 56 Barbara Allen Guilfoyle, “After Cuisinart, the Deluge,” Princeton Architectural Press, 2002). Industrial Design 22 (May 1978): 44; “Selected Objects,” Julia Child’s 61 John Wall, “U.S. Design—with Old-World Élan,” Washington Kitchen at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History, Times, February 10, 1986, Insight sec. http://americanhistory.si.edu/juliachild/jck/html/textonly/ob22.asp. 62 “Development and Implementation of Student Design Projects 57 Mimi Sheraton, “Mixing It Up,” New York, September 29, in the Area of Vocational Rehabilitation,” n.d., Marc Harrison Papers, 1975; “Deck the Halls, Clear the Shelves,” Time, January 9, 1978. Hagley Museum and Library; The ILZRO Industrialized Housing System 58 Guilfoyle, “After Cuisinart, the Deluge.” (New York: International Lead Zinc Research Organization, 1977). This content downloaded from 132.174.251.59 on Wed, 15 Jan 2025 14:02:11 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Getting a Grip 225 Fig. 9. Marc Harrison, Cuisinart DCL 7-PRO, 1979. (Marc Harrison Papers, Hagley Museum and Library.) in a note scrawled across the bottom of a 1986 Though Harrison articulated disability-related Cuisinart advertisement: “Large handle. Large benefits in internal documents for Cuisinarts, the paddle-like controls. (Gross motion vs. fine-finger company’s advertising never mentioned anything to acuity). Large white letters on dark field for maxi- do with physical impairment, describing the appliance mum contrast. Lettering on controls at angle of view instead as simply “the best.”65 The company pro- when using product” (fig. 14).63 This was the lan- moted this and other products designed by Harrison guage of rehabilitation and occupational therapy, as highly functional and highly sophisticated. Pitch- reflecting research on arthritis, Parkinson’s disease, ing to the bridal registry market in particular, and visual disabilities.64 Cuisinarts sought to establish their food processor as a part of the requisite toolkit for the well-heeled house- hold.66 It frequently appeared in Craig Claiborne’s 63 “A New Fruit Dessert: Fresh and Frozen Fluffs,” handwritten notes on magazine advertisement clipping, n.d., ser. I, box 4, Marc Harrison Papers, Hagley Museum and Library; Harrison or a Cuisinart representative used similar language in an internal, undated product 65 “The Food Processor Revolution: Act II”; “Cuisinart Model description: “Cuisinart DLC-X Food Processor,” n.d., ser. I, box 4, Marc CFP-9: Good as It Was, It’s Better Now,” advertisement , Harrison Papers, Hagley Museum and Library. ser. I, box 4, Marc Harrison Papers, Hagley Museum and Library; 64 While Harrison left few explicit explanations of his design Craig Claiborne, “She Demonstrates How to Cook Best with New process, he noted research on arthritis, Parkinson’s, and “visual def- Cuisinart,” New York Times, January 7, 1976, Food Day sec. icits” in a questionnaire for a gallery exhibition. Marc Harrison, 66 “Do You, Cuisinarts, Promise to Commit Yourself to the “Questionnaire for Katonah Gallery,” November 1983, ser. I, box 8, Bridal Market?” advertisement, n.d., ser. I, box 4, Marc Harrison Marc Harrison Papers, Hagley Museum and Library. Papers, Hagley Museum and Library. This content downloaded from 132.174.251.59 on Wed, 15 Jan 2025 14:02:11 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 226 Winterthur Portfolio 46:4 rubber handles with rippling “fins” at the top were applied to twelve initial products, including a veg- etable peeler, can opener, pizza wheel, and orange zester (fig. 15). With their thick bar handles, over- sized curves to protect the hand from sharp blades, and a name that could be read upside down or backward, OXO GoodGrips, like the Cuisinart, blended a bright modern style with features for a spectrum of physical abilities. While the Cuisinart’s geometric sleek lines projected an image of profes- sionalism and sophistication, OXO’s grips sug- gested familiarity and reliability, even in products that looked quite different from their competition. The design team purposefully chose a shape and texture that would resemble bicycle grips, so that users would intuitively sense their sturdiness and soft grip.70 As Farber described them, the handles “say ‘I’m special. Come feel me and you’ll see how Fig. 10. Model house kitchen, 1977. From The ILZRO special I am.’”71 Industrialized Housing System (New York: International OXO avoided reference to arthritis or other Lead Zinc Research Organization, Inc., 1977), n.p. (In- kinds of hand pain in marketing, following the ternational Lead Zinc Research Organization, Inc.) pattern of Cuisinart in emphasizing function and style. Still, some materials hinted at the design gourmet recipes in the New York Times, was stocked source of the characteristic black handles. Hands alongside Le Creuset cookware at imported food in the images were both male and female and of a shops, and was included in design shows at the range of ages; one hand sported a Band-Aid, sug- Whitney Museum and the Philadelphia Museum gesting injury (fig. 16). Ad copy forming outlines of Art.67 Such was its position as a chic appliance around the various products noted that the han- for the up-to-date household, it was even rumored dles let users “hold the tools the way you want to that the Cuisinart was a design inspiration for the hold them, not some way you’re forced to hold Apple Macintosh, first released in 1984.68 them” and promised that “the grip is as unique More than ten years after Harrison designed as your fingerprints.” This message of reassurance the new version of the Cuisinart food processor, makes no explicit reference to disability but in- another industrial designer drew on personal ob- stead puts the focus on broadly familiar themes servation of disability to develop a successful and of comfort and security. One line of text suggests distinctive household product. In 1989, a retired a winking reference for those who might be in the kitchenware designer named Sam Farber was vaca- know about universal design, noting that “a uni- tioning in France with his wife, Betsy. Betsy had versal design makes Good Grips easy for everyone arthritis in her hands and struggled with the old- to hold on to and easy for everyone to use.”72 By this fashioned metal kitchen tools in their rental moment in the late 1980s, the term “universal” house. Sam and Betsy devised clay models for a was becoming more common among design insiders larger, more forgiving handle, and when they re- and those familiar with the politics of disability. turned to New York, they worked with the up-and- In other cases, established companies discovered coming firm Smart Design to develop the OXO disability research as an avenue to new product im- GoodGrips line of kitchen tools.69 The oversized provements. The Fiskars scissors company, one of the longest-operating product manufacturers in 67 Claiborne, “She Demonstrates How to Cook Best”; “The Europe, produced a solid, reliable product line of Pampered Chef,” New York, March 3, 1975; Whitney Museum of American Art, High Styles: Twentieth-Century American Design (New scissors and other cutting tools for 400 years before York: Whitney Museum of American Art in association with Sum- mit Books, 1985); Philadelphia Museum of Art, Design since 1945 (Philadelphia: Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1983). 70 Pilar Guzman, “Handles with Care,” One, 2000, 142. 68 Wall, “U.S. Design—with Old-World Élan,” 56–57. 71 Sam Farber, personal communication, February 2, 2008. 69 See http://www.design.ncsu.edu/cud/projserv_ps/projects 72 “Gadgets You Can Grip Are Tools You Can Use,” OXO /case_studies/oxo.htm; Sam Farber, personal communication, February GoodGrips catalog, ca. 1990, Division of Medicine and Science, 2, 2008. National Museum of American History. This content downloaded from 132.174.251.59 on Wed, 15 Jan 2025 14:02:11 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Getting a Grip 227 Fig. 11. Fixtures, 1977. From The ILZRO Industrialized Housing System (New York: International Lead Zinc Research Organization, Inc., 1977), 18. (International Lead Zinc Research Organization, Inc.) opening a subsidiary in the United States.73 By the the tools on the tabletop as they cut (fig. 17). After fo- 1990s, they faced stiff competition in the United cus groups of various demographics responded well States, with other scissors makers mimicking their to the new model, the “Golden Age” line was renamed brightly colored handle designs.74 Considering the “Softouch,” emphasizing the product’s benefits with- older, female customer base for craft supplies seemed out making explicit reference to an older age group.76 like “common sense” to the research and develop- Concurrent with Fiskars’s new product devel- ment design team, led by engineer Jim Boda and in- opment, another big name in consumer products, dustrial designer Doug Birkholz.75 They developed a Tupperware, was also searching for new updates new “Golden Age” scissors designed to relieve pres- to their classic designs. After Earl Tupper’s death sure and strain on the hand. The scissors sprang open in 1983, the company struggled to adapt to social automatically, while the handles’ unconventional trends such as the increasing use of take-out food angle, jutting up from the blade, allowed users to rest and microwave ovens and the presence of working women who did not have time to give or attend 73 See http://www.fiskarsgroup.com/corporation/corporation_2 Tupperware parties.77 In 1992, the company hired.html. 74 “Scissors and Shears,” Consumer Reports, October 1992, 672–73. 76 James Mueller, “The Case for Universal Design: If You Can’t Use 75 Molly Follette Story, James L. Mueller, and Ronald L. Mace, It, It’s Just Art,” Ageing International 22, no. 1 (March 1995); Laura Herbst, The Universal Design File: Designing for People of All Ages and Abilities “Nobody’s Perfect,” Popular Science 250, no. 1 ( January 1997): 64–66. (Raleigh, NC: Center for Universal Design, 1998), 90–92; Jim 77 Patricia Leigh Brown, “At Tupperware, Rethinking the Bowl, Boda, personal communication, December 10, 2008. Perfecting the Burp,” New York Times, June 10, 1993. This content downloaded from 132.174.251.59 on Wed, 15 Jan 2025 14:02:11 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 228 Winterthur Portfolio 46:4 Fig. 12. Marc Harrison, food processor drawings, 1978. (Marc Harrison Papers, Hagley Museum and Library.) Morison Cousins, a designer known for a clean, to give a more sturdy look for countertop storage of modernist style, as vice president of design.78 Cousins snack foods and bulk ingredients, with a lid that ex- told the New York Times that he took inspiration from tended beyond the base so that they could be, in his his mother, Rose, who struggled to use her original words, “opened with an elbow.” Cousins described Tupperware containers, when he sought to contem- these changes as responses to the “‘ceremony’ of Tup- porize the product line. He produced a new version perware,” bringing focus to the opening and closing of Tupper’s classic Wonderlier bowls with large flower- of the containers. In Tupper’s era, the plastic bowls or lip-shaped tabs to make them easier to open (fig. 18). had been known for their “burping” seals; now they He made the new One Touch canisters solid white, could be known for easy-to-use lids.79 78 Mitchell Owens, “Museum Plastics,” New York Times, April 3, 1997. 79 Brown, “At Tupperware.” This content downloaded from 132.174.251.59 on Wed, 15 Jan 2025 14:02:11 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Getting a Grip 229 Fig. 13. Marc Harrison, food processor drawings, 1978. (Marc Harrison Papers, Hagley Museum and Library.) As universal design became a more common the names of prominent housewares designers. 80 tactic and familiar term in the design community, Articles in the lifestyle sections of the Boston Globe, it came to suggest a new, creative, and progressive approach to product development. OXO, Fiskars, and Tupperware may not have emphasized dis- 80 Mike McClintock, “User-Friendly Kitchens Coming of Age: Aesthetics and Barrier-Free Access Meet in ‘Universal Design,’” ability in advertising, but they disseminated the Washington Home, July 19, 1990; Patricia Dane Rogers, “When the Ob- news in other ways. Universal design offered an en- ject Is Ease,” Washington Home, September 17, 1992; Suzanne Slesin, gaging story for a certain kind of consumer, one who “The Once and Future Brush,” New York Times, February 16, 1995; Owens, “Museum Plastics”; “A Discussion about Design,” panel with attended museum and gallery shows, read the home Herbert Muschamp, Steven Holl, and Niels Diffrient, Charlie Rose, or design sections of the newspaper and might know December 29, 2000, http://www.charlierose.com/view/interview/3330. This content downloaded from 132.174.251.59 on Wed, 15 Jan 2025 14:02:11 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 230 Winterthur Portfolio 46:4 Fig. 14. Cuisinarts advertisement with handwritten notes by Marc Harrison, 1986. (Marc Harrison Papers, Hagley Museum and Library.) New York Times, and Washington Post and in design and commercially viable, an “outgrowth of con- magazines including Metropolis and Popular Mechan- temporary culture’s emphasis on diversity” as well ics told the story of how designers were “taking a cue as an important move toward addressing the large from designs for the disabled” in pursuit of “making “postwar baby boomer” market segment.83 Laid out products that are practical for all consumers.”81 on brightly colored exhibition panels that stood These stories emphasized the benefit “for all” when out from the Cooper-Hewitt’s mansion walls, the research into physical disability led to visually appeal- exhibition had a feeling of a trend-focused trade ing, sensuous objects. “It’s a paradoxical truth that an show, presenting the future of design in sections on elegant solution for a specialized user often makes an offices, kitchens, and bathrooms. A centerpiece of inspired product for everyone else,” mused a Boston the show was a model “Universal Kitchen” designed Globe reporter in 1993; a New York Times observer of by Cuisinart designer Marc Harrison with his RISD stu- a 1999 housewares trade show commented that dents (fig. 19). For almost a decade leading up to the “thick, black, easily gripped rubberized handles show, Harrison and his students had conducted research seemed to be on every implement, a la Oxo’s Good with the stated goal “to recreate the kitchen, an every- Grip [sic]. What originated to help people with arthri- day icon of poor design.”84 The Universal Kitchen tis cope in the kitchen has gone mainstream.”82 In responded to specific accessibility concerns with fea- the 1980s and ’90s, when manufacturers were in- tures like open space under work surfaces, adjust- creasingly highlighting affordable design in every- able-height counters and cabinets, large bar-shaped day products, a universal approach provided an handles and drawer pulls, and slide-out shelves and added value to their wares. compartments to eliminate strain in reaching. Other In 1998, a new exhibition at the Smithsonian’s features addressed more general usability issues, with Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum in New York “snack stations” for the common task of preparing left- affirmed that disability had become a hot topic in the overs and enough space for spouses, grandparents, and design world. The show, called Unlimited by Design, children to access food and counters at the same time. described universal design as both socially progressive Students also responded to environmental concerns 81 Madeline Drexler, “A Universal Handle,” Boston Globe Magazine, 83 Unlimited by Design exhibition, Cooper-Hewitt, National Design December 12, 1993, 8. Museum, Smithsonian Institution, New York, 1998. 82 Ibid.; Florence Fabricant, “Food Stuff,” New York Times, January 84 Universal Kitchen poster, Rhode Island School of Design, 1998, 20, 1999, Style sec., 8. Marc Harrison Papers, Hagley Museum and Library. This content downloaded from 132.174.251.59 on Wed, 15 Jan 2025 14:02:11 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Getting a Grip 231 with proposals for gray-water recycling systems and