Your Forever Shower: Planning for Future Accessibility

The shower is one of the most important areas of the bathroom and has the power to really impact your daily life. 

So when building or renovating your forever home, it’s important to plan for how you may need to access your shower in the future. Designing a more accessible shower not only assists any guests with accessibility requirements, but makes a huge difference in the future. When you’re building or renovating a bathroom for your forever home, your family’s needs will change and accessibility may become more of a requirement for future living.

Easy Entry

Plan for accessibility early on and you’ll save yourself time and money further down the track. Here are three tips to ensure your forever shower has easy access:

1. No steps. Ensure you don’t have to step up or step down into your shower. Factor in a seamless entry that makes accessing your shower simple.
2. Ditch the hinge. A sliding shower door may be a more effective choice than an open shower door, particularly if you’re short on space. Alternatively, opt for no door at all and create a walk-in shower.
3. Wider entry. The standard 800mm entry may be fine for now, but a 1m+ entryway will ensure easy shower access into the future for any family member or guest with accessibility requirements.

Ensure Safety & Functionality

Although the future can be unpredictable, there are some broad functional and safety decisions you can make to creative a versatile space for now and the future. Here are our top three considerations that you can take into account in the building process:

1. Non-slip material. Think about the material of your shower floor, and opt for a surface that reduces risk of slipping. A product like the Roca Cyprus Shower Floor combines safety and aesthetics with a contemporary textured finish that includes an anti-slip feature, heightening shower safety without compromising on appearance.
2. Reinforced walls. If you’re creating a brand new bathroom, consider reinforcing your walls for future durability. You might not need a grab rail now, but future-proofing by incorporating studs will ensure your walls can withstand the pressure requirement – making installation much easier.
3. Grab rails for extra stability. Grab rails have come a long way in recent years. Products like the Mobi Grab Rail or the Posh Solus Mk 3 Grab Rail Showerhave a small footprint and can easily complement your bathroom’s aesthetic, with all the benefits of added support.

Mixer Magic

The shower is primarily a functional space, so make sure you think about how you, your family and your guests will actually use it. You’ll need to make sure that you’re communicating these requirements to your builders.

1. Location, location, location. Consider the location of the mixer, and place it somewhere easy to reach so that water temperature and pressure can be adjusted easily. When it comes to the product’s aesthetic, consider products like the Mizu Drift MK2 range of mixers, with a timeless pin-lever design that’s been popular in bathrooms for years.
2. Think thermostatics. Thermostatic technology lets you set your shower’s ideal temperature. Integrate thermostatics into your shower with Roca Thermostatics or GROHE SmartControl, or use the American Standard EasySET PreSet Controller which features an external controller, allowing you to turn on the shower with your pre-set shower temperature before you even step in.