There’s much more to designing custom carpet for the seniors living sector than just creating a pretty pattern – the comfort of the vision-impaired and mobility-challenged must also be taken into account.
This need was top of mind for us when we were recently commissioned to design and manufacture custom designed quality Axminster carpet for new retirement living community, Aveo Robertson Park, in Brisbane’s south.
Our Managing Director David Williams said the team had to be careful not to design anything that went from black to white too quickly and with too much repetition.
We’ve all come across patterns that have that strobe affect – often in clothing, linen and sometimes wallpaper. It can make your vision blur,” David said, “ Imagine if you were vision-impaired and a strobe-like pattern was all over the floor – that room can suddenly become unsafe due simply to the pattern that was chosen.
“It’s also important that the carpet isn’t too thick and soft as this can make mobility difficult for people in wheel chairs or who have limited walking capacity.
“We went through a few different design options to make sure the carpet we designed delivered catered to the different issues.”
For this brand new high-end, luxury retirement living community we designed carpets for the communal area, foyer and bar. Luxury was the brief, and luxury we delivered.
“The client wanted something free flowing, soft and relaxing in warm, this-is-home, autumnal tones. But it also had to have the feel of luxury and high quality. On that I think we delivered,” David said.
“We also wanted a carpet that represented best value for money in terms of its ability to stand up to a lot of punishment for the next 10 to 20 years.”
The job was not without its challenges. Due to programming constraints we were asked to turn the project around in 8 weeks – a tight timeline that was achieved, much to the delight of the client.