A unique project is bringing “excellence to all”- including disabled people.
Kelvin Hall in Glasgow has re-opened following a £35million revamp. The new venue brings together civic, higher education and national organisations under one roof. It now houses 1.5million pieces from Glasgow’s civic collection, Glasgow University’s Hunterian Museum, the National Library of Scotland’s Moving Image Archive, and have a new role as a cultural, research and training centre.
And it also includes a state-of-the-art wheelchair-accessible, assisted toilet facility, supplied and installed by Closomat.
The toilet means that anyone for whom a conventional wheelchair-accessible toilet isn’t suitable can now enjoy the benefits of Kelvin Hall, relaxed in the knowledge there are suitable toilet facilities to hand. Based on a Changing Places toilet, for people who need the help of at least one carer, the room has the additional space, adult-sized height adjustable changing bench, privacy screen and ceiling track hoist that are required fixtures in a Changing Places; it further has a Closomat Palma Vita wash and dry toilet, instead of a traditional WC, and a height adjustable washbasin.
Kelvin Hall is now a world-leading facility, which brings together civic, higher education and national organisations under one roof. It is excellence available to all, explained special projects team leader Robert Gartshore. The assisted accessible toilet demonstrates that excellence for all: it delivers all the extra care equipment that helps people who need assistance with their intimate hygiene, and, by replacing the conventional WC with a Closomat that washes and dries the user so they don’t have to manually wipe, we are further extending the useability and raising the level of hygiene available.
Adds Kelvin Grimes, Closomat’s away from home washroom project manager,
Changing Places toilets are designed to meet the needs of anyone who needs a carer’s help to go to the loo, ranging from a wheelchair-bound child or adult to morbidly obese. But the equipment within, especially when the traditional loo is replaced with a wash & dry toilet, extends its suitability to literally millions of other people- those with incontinence issues, stoma, for example.
Under latest Building Regulations and good practice guidelines, a Changing Places toilet is ‘desirable’ in buildings to which numbers of the public have access. Since their introduction a decade ago, 850+ have been opened across the UK. Under British Standards, a Changing Places is in addition to conventional (Building Regulations Document M) wheelchair accessible toilets, and provides 12m2, with additional equipment including an adult-sized height adjustable changing bench and ceiling track hoist.
Closomat is Britain’s biggest provider of fully accessible toilets, in domestic environments and ’away from home’, including a substantial number of Changing Places facilities, and their smaller, counterpart Space to Change toilets.
Closomat is unique in its ability to deliver- in-house- design advice, supply, installation, commissioning, project management and maintenance across the ambit of accessible toileting equipment, including the Closomat wash and dry (automatic) toilet. To help leisure venues ‘get it right’, Closomat has a raft of downloadable information, including sector-specific white papers, CAD blocks, room renders and videos.
