BuildAble specializes in making your home accessible, safe, inclusive — and beautiful
At first glance, the bathroom looks like it just belongs in a chic spa. Dark textured tiles create an appealing contrast to pristine all-white walls, while a chrome toilet paper holder and a matching curved towel bar are strategically placed beside a slightly elevated toilet. But if you look closer, you’ll see that the toilet, with its twenty-and-a-half-inch height, is designed for easy transfer from a wheelchair while the modern toilet paper holder and towel bar double as grab bars that support up to 500 lbs. of force.
The design is just one example of how BuildAble, Canada’s only nurse-led renovation company, is reimagining the relationship between design and accessibility. Now, the company, which specializes in building accessible spaces in residential homes, businesses and retirement residences, is set to launch a new division that will give people access to small, high-impact pieces — without the wait.
“We view modifying homes to be accessible as a health care issue, but that doesn’t mean the design has to look like a hospital,” says Kyla Cullain, a clinical nurse specialist who, along with Sean MacGinnis, an elevating devices mechanic, founded BuildAble in 2013. “Instead of a cookie-cutter approach, our designs consider the unique health needs, mobility goals, personal taste and budget of each client.” The demand for their services grew quickly, and in 2016, they merged with another small renovation company and brought on a new partner, Dan Charette, with a background in fine carpentry.
For the past seven years, BuildAble has worked with a wide range of clients — from accident survivors and the elderly to those living with long-term disabilities or mobility-limiting illnesses (such as Parkinson’s, ALS or MS). It has constructed safe, comfortable and easy-to-navigate spaces such as accessible kitchens, living rooms and home offices as well as barrier-free bathrooms, bathtub cut-outs, ramps, entry ways and door widening as well as stair lifts and platform lifts. For example, in anticipation of the warmer months ahead, BuildAble is redesigning an inaccessible waterfront property into being fully accessible with a ramp using stone and rock. The company has built and created completely new livable spaces and restored the ability of clients in wheelchairs to cook by lowering sections of kitchen countertops and installing pull-down cabinets.
No matter the project, says Cullain, during the design process BuildAble considers long-term use and how other family members, such as kids, will interact with the spaces being created.
“Being nurse-managed, we are greater equipped to understand pathology and injury progression, diagnosis or age, which is important because it allows us to create spaces that will be functional for years ahead,” says Cullain.
“It also allows us to work seamlessly with our clients’ occupational therapists and other health care providers to complete that circle of care.”
“We also cross-train our carpenters to be better equipped to understand clients’ questions from a health perspective and not just a renovation perspective. We then try to look at the whole family unit and how a modification or addition will work for everyone involved.”
After seeing an uptick in the demand for small, high-impact pieces that will allow people to safely age in place or to quickly transition from hospitals back into a personal residence, BuildAble will launch its
RapidACCESS division in June. It will focus on simple modifications that will not only get people back into their homes quickly but also prevent the possibility of reinjury or rehospitalization. Through an online booking system, clients will be able to will select the products they need and have them installed within 48 hours.
“We have seen a huge increase in demand for this service, especially with people wanting to bring home their parents from assisted-living facilities because of the pandemic,” says Cullain. “One of the challenges of discharging people home is that assessments and large renovations take time. These simple modifications will make a major difference.” This will be the only service of its kind in Ottawa.
A standard RapidACCESS package will include bathtub cut-outs, non-slip surfaces and grab bars, which typically takes three hours to install. In comparison, when BuildAble completes a bathroom renovation, for example, it can take quite a few weeks due to the level of customization.
“In addition to the standard packages, we will still have some solutions that are high-end and multi-functional, but the primary focus is on simple safety solutions for every budget,” says Cullain. “We want to make sure people are safe, even if they aren’t ready or don’t want entire renos completed.”
As Ontario reopens its economy in phases, Cullain says the RapidACCESS launch and resulting services will adhere to stringent COVID-19 policies that will require clients to also ensure they are creating safe working environments for the BuildAble team accessing their home.
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