Universal Design: Bleach Bottle Opener
This project was completed in conjunction with Enabled by Design, an online space for participants to share their experiences with and ideas about products that are meant to enable independent living.
Interview with Francis by Josh Benjamin Macdonald
Frances is living with servere rheumatoid arthritis in her hands that cause her a lot of pain, discomfort and difficulty when using her fingers to grip objects. This becomes very frustrating when attempting tasks like fastening buttons or removing the cap from a bottle.
In the video Frances demonstrates opening a bleach bottle by wedging it’s cap in an open door hinge and closing it slightly on the sides of the cap while turning the bottle with both hands. Once it the cap is loosened she can usually manage to twist it off the rest of the way, however this time the cap was fastened too tightly by whoever used it last.
In order to help Frances unscrew bleach bottles on her own, we needed to make something that would exert pressure on the sides of the cap much like our thumb and pointer finger normally would. When testing our prototypes at the Glasgow Centre for inclusive living, we found that many people have problems similar to Frances, especially with mouthwash bottles. Our final working prototype has two ends, one large and one small. All the user needs to do to open a bottle is fit the appropriate end over the cap and turn.
