Design Principles

Overview

There are countless ways to make a home animal-friendly; however, the Haven Homes project focuses on concepts intended to be adopted by large-scale property developers. Therefore, the following stakeholder groups must be considered:

Investors
Construction Managers
Property Managers
Tenants/Buyers without Pets
Tenants/Buyers with Pets
Pets

To guide development toward concepts that would maximize the benefit and minimize the cost to each of these groups, the following design principles were applied:

Everything must pencil out.

Widespread adoption of pet-friendly features could benefit millions of animals; however, to be adopted, these concepts need to appeal to capitalists, not charities, and must make financial sense to people who definitely care about profit, but do not necessarily care about animals.

The impact to all stakeholder groups must be considered in financial terms. Therefore, all pet features must…

…be relatively inexpensive when built into new construction.
…have a net positive impact on value and risk management.
…be simple to build using standard construction methods and readily available materials.
…require minimal maintenance.
…not detract from the perceived value of the property for people without pets.
…be seen as a significant value for people with pets, resulting in higher prices and/or lower vacancy rates.
…reduce pet anxiety or otherwise improve pet behavior, resulting in less property damage and less nuisance to other tenants.

Design spaces, not products.

Products are problematic. Products require continual repair and replacement, whereas spaces are built once and require little to no maintenance. Products get outdated, while spaces are future-proof. Products provide specific functions; spaces are flexible and can serve multiple purposes.

Furthermore, no single pet product will ever work for all animals, so it is a waste of time to try to find or invent the perfect one to build into the home. Instead, functional spaces should be designed to work with many existing products, enhancing their features and limiting property damage.

The goal is to design a home where animals belong—not as an afterthought but as an essential part of the household—by including spaces for all their essential needs.

Human needs come first.

Pet features can only be added after all the humans’ needs are met and cannot come at the expense of human utility or enjoyment of the home.

This is compatible with even the most animal-centric perspective, because no feature for animals can match the benefit of having a happy, healthy human caregiver who has extra time and energy to spend with them.

Transform low-value spaces.

A great way to balance the needs of people and animals is to put features for animals in spaces that are of little or no value to people.

Animals do not care about aesthetics and can squeeze into tight spots. The lowest value space to humans can be of high value to animals, especially cats, who love tiny alcoves and areas up out of reach of most people.

First, do no harm.

As much as we may love them, for this project, a benefit to an animal cannot come at a net cost to humans. Pet features must not detract significant value from the home for people who do not wish to use them, particularly those who do not have pets.

Aim for win-win-win solutions where all stakeholder groups benefit, or at the very least, there are no significant drawbacks for any group.

Second, do two things.

Whenever possible, pet features should have a secondary function that has nothing to do with animals so that space and resources are not wasted when the home they are in does not have animals living there.

Everything should look normal.

Few people—even those who love their pets deeply—want their home’s aesthetic to revolve around their animals. Therefore, pet features must not make a home look like that of an eccentric animal enthusiast who has given their pets priority over all else.

On the contrary, pet features should draw no more attention to themselves than a closet door or a bookshelf would. No pet feature can look odd, unplanned, or out-of-place. Through design and material choice, pet features should blend so naturally into the home environment that they appear unremarkable, effectively hidden in plain sight.

Build it for life.

Pet features should be designed to withstand daily use by multiple tenants and pets, yet still last for decades with minimal maintenance.

Anticipate damage that could be caused by animals and take steps to avoid it. Plan for all spaces accessible by animals to get dirty regularly.

Through design and material choices, make everything hard to break and easy to clean. For reliability, use tried-and-true materials and construction methods.

Make good habits irresistible.

For any concept to be worthwhile enough to adopt, it must be used as intended.

Humans respond to incentives. Use these to guide people toward good habits. Make the path of least resistance point toward proper usage.

Reward the decision-makers.

Provide compelling benefits directly to the people who will decide whether to use pet features as intended.

For example: Suppose keeping an object, like a water bowl or a litter box, in a certain space would help reduce animal anxiety and avoid property damage. These are long-term benefits that primarily affect the pets and the property owner, respectively; however, a tenant will ultimately be deciding how to use this space. In this case, there must be an additional benefit for the tenant as well—such an obvious, significant benefit for keeping that object where it is intended that tenants would need extraordinary reasons not to do so.

Nothing can be complicated.

All pet features must be easy to understand and hard to mess up.

A feature that requires training or a manual to use is too complicated. Instead, they must be simple and intuitive, if not completely self-explanatory.

Eliminate mistakes by design.

Whenever feasible, remove all possibilities of incorrect usage.

Make it very difficult for humans to cut off access to pet features accidentally, especially those that take care of an animal’s essential needs.

Shorten the task list.

Rational behavior dictates that the path of least resistance will generally be followed.

New pet features must require less work than their traditional alternatives; otherwise, they cannot be expected to be used consistently, even if they provide additional benefits.

Foster healthy, happy animals.

Pet owners already care about the health and wellbeing of their animals, and landlords should too, because unhealthy or anxious pets can cause many kinds of property damage.

Happy, healthy pets typically don’t cause nearly as much damage, but few people are experts who know exactly how to properly take care of animals. For that matter, few people know exactly how to take care of humans, either, but we all get constant help from the world around us, including architecture, which guides us toward smarter decisions, helping us constantly avoid conflicts, inconveniences, and injuries without us even knowing it.

Living in environments made for our care and comfort reduces our stress and anxiety in countless ways we rarely notice. If just a fraction of the effort put toward designing such environments for people is put toward designing them for animals too, it can make a massive difference in reducing their anxiety as well.

Animal lives are essential.

The vast majority of Americans view their pets as members of their family, yet their homes were not designed for everyone in their family; rather, only the human members were considered.

Fix this discrepancy by designing architectural elements that take the needs of these pets seriously and address them with the same importance given to humans’ needs.

Focus on the mundane.

Features that provide novelty or entertainment are often exciting and interesting, but tastes vary widely between various people and their pets, so such features are more likely to be wasted.

Instead, provide necessities, not luxuries. Design an environment that helps take care of the boring, everyday needs of all animals, leaving the fun stuff to individual pet owners who know what they and their animals like.

Create consistent care routines.

Inconsistent care causes stress and anxiety in animals, and most pets, like cats and dogs, thrive on routine.

Animal-friendly features should help people maintain regular pet care routines. To that end, these features should facilitate the automation of routine pet care tasks that can be automated safely and reliably.

Don’t forget senior animals.

When designing the environment, consider that senior animals often can’t move around as easily as younger animals can. Ensure that the basic necessities are accessible to them and any other animals with limited mobility.