The starting figures are few: a 150 cm diameter wheelchair turning circle, a clear passage of at least 90 cm along one long side of the bed, a clear door width of at least 80 cm, and 85 cm for the door giving access to the unit. The references are Law 13/1989 and DM 236/1989. The trouble is that almost no room declared accessible fails on these four measurements: it fails on what people believe they know about them. Here are six widespread assumptions, and what the numbers actually say.
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How many accessible rooms must a hotel have: what the regulation says
The belief that the number is set by national law is wrong. Law 13/1989 introduced provisions for removing architectural barriers in private buildings, and DM 236/1989 sets out the technical requirements, distinguishing between accessibility, visitability and adaptability. For accommodation businesses, the level required is accessibility of the communal areas and of a certain number of rooms with their bathrooms.
That number is set by regional legislation on accommodation businesses: some regions work with fixed bands, others with percentage criteria linked to the property’s classification. It’s the first thing to check with the local technical office or the designer, before drawing anything at all. Here you’ll find the furniture design criteria; formal compliance is certified by whoever signs off on the project.
Wheelchair turning space: the 150 cm in a real room
It’s not enough for the 150 cm circle to fit on the floor plan. The 150 cm circle survives on the drawing and dies during fit-out, under a luggage rack, a waste bin or a planter that turns up at the end of the project. It needs to be checked with the furniture actually in place, and it needs to be explained to housekeeping, because that’s the first spot where the trolley ends up.
Then there’s the word “clear”, which has a precise meaning: clear from the floor up to the height of a seated person. A worktop suspended at 70 cm doesn’t take away turning space if there’s nothing underneath it; a chest of drawers resting on the floor does, for the same footprint.
The circle is needed at one useful point in the room, in the bathroom, and in front of doors on both sides. For narrower passages, smaller manoeuvres apply: a 180-degree turn in roughly 140×140 cm, a 90-degree turn in roughly 140×110 cm.
Door width: clear opening versus nominal size
An 80 cm door doesn’t give you 80 cm of passage. The clear opening is the actual passage with the door open at 90 degrees: the frame, the rebate and the thickness of the door itself eat into a slice of it. To get 80 cm clear, in practice you need a door with a nominal size of 90 cm, and the same applies to the door giving access to the unit, where the requirement rises to 85 cm. The bathroom door deserves an extra check, because there the direction of opening, the bulk of the door and the approach space on both sides all add up: a door opening inward into a small bathroom wipes out the manoeuvring space.
Bed dimensions and position in an accessible room
The bed isn’t placed last: it decides whether the room works, and it should be positioned first. On at least one long side you need a minimum clearance of 90 cm for the wheelchair to draw up alongside and for a lateral transfer; the measurement that actually makes the room usable, though, is 110-120 cm, which leaves room for a companion. On the other side and at the foot of the bed, a clearance of no less than 90 cm is still needed wherever people pass through.
This almost always rules out a bed pushed against the wall on one side. A 160×200 cm double bed with 120 cm on one side and 90 on the other needs at least 370 cm of usable wall width, before you’ve even counted the wardrobe. This is why the accessible room needs to be identified at the very start of the project, choosing the room with the most favourable geometry and closest to the lift. On the vertical measurement, the criterion is that the top of the mattress sits at the height of a wheelchair seat, between 45 and 50 cm from the floor, measured to the finished level.
| Element | Measurement |
|---|---|
| Mattress top from the floor, finished | 45-50 cm |
| Frame or divan base height, with a 20-22 cm mattress | 25-30 cm |
| Clear space under the bed for a hoist | at least 15 cm |
| Clearance on the main side | 90 cm minimum, 110-120 recommended |
| Clearance at the foot of the bed | 90 cm wherever people pass through |
A mobile hoist is the variable almost no one considers in the specification: if the property expects guests with severely reduced mobility, the hoist’s base needs to fit under the bed, which rules out ottoman storage beds, deep drawer units and closed bases sitting on the floor. The seat height of the bed is an accessibility requirement, and it’s controlled by choosing the right divan base for hotels, because bases vary by several centimetres from one model to another.
Washbasin unit and approachable worktops: the dimensions for a wheelchair
Wall-hung and approachable aren’t the same thing. The textbook case is the washbasin unit that looks wall-hung but has a deep drawer that comes down to 40 cm from the floor. For a wheelchair to fit under a worktop, four measurements need to work together.
| Measurement | Value |
|---|---|
| Clear height under the worktop | at least 70 cm, roughly 70-75 |
| Height of the finished worktop | 75-80 cm |
| Clear width of the recess | at least 80-90 cm |
| Clear depth of the recess | at least 60 cm |
The recess needs to be genuinely empty: no hanging drawer unit, low front rail, central leg or power strip hanging under the worktop, with the sockets brought up onto the worktop or moved to the side. The same applies to the desk, the minibar shelf and the TV console.
In the bathroom the same dimensions become stricter. The basin needs a worktop at 80-85 cm, clear height under the front edge of at least 70 cm, clear depth of at least 60 cm, no pedestal and no trap protruding at the front: the trap should be set back or recessed and the hot pipework protected, because it ends up right at knee height. Drawer units and storage move to the side, so the room doesn’t lose capacity: it’s the principle behind designing accessible hotel bathroom furniture. The WC needs at least 100 cm of clearance on the transfer side, with a fixed grab bar and a fold-up grab bar; the shower should be flush with the floor, because a tray with a lip, even just 3 cm, is a barrier.
The plinth is the most silent flaw: a five-centimetre overhang stops footrests from getting close, and it never shows up in a rendering.
Wardrobe, bedside table and controls: accessible heights in the room
A wardrobe that’s compliant on paper can still be unusable for the one thing a guest needs to do with it: hang up a garment. Standard hanging rails sit at 170-180 cm from the floor, while a seated person can comfortably reach 110-120 cm, with a practical reach limit of around 130 cm. There are two solutions: a fixed rail lowered to 110-120 cm, with a second, higher rail for staff, sturdy and free of mechanisms that can fail; or a pull-down rail fitted to the higher one, which is more flexible. With just one accessible room, the pull-down rail is the better choice; from two rooms upward, a fixed rail holds up better over the years. Useful shelving should then be concentrated between 40 and 130 cm, knobs should be replaced with bar handles that can be gripped with a full hand, and sliding doors should be used where the passage is narrow, because an open hinged door can steal up to 60 cm. In hotel wardrobes designed for accessible rooms, what matters most is a shallow depth and a lowered hanging rail that can be reached while seated.
The bedside table follows the same principle: top between 45 and 55 cm, resting on legs or wall-hung rather than on a continuous plinth, with a socket and USB port on the side between 40 and 90 cm. A mirror designed for someone standing up cuts out anyone seated: what’s needed is a full-height model with a low bottom edge, or a tilting one above the basin.
Anything the guest operates should, in the end, sit within a band between 40 and 140 cm, with the ideal range between 80 and 120.
| Element | Height from the floor |
|---|---|
| Door handles | 85-95 cm |
| Switches and light controls | 75-140 cm, ideally 90-110 |
| Power sockets | 45-90 cm, never below 40 |
| Thermostat and climate controls | 90-120 cm |
| Wall-mounted hooks | 110-120 cm |
| Bathroom grab bars | axis at around 80 cm |
| Emergency call cord in the bathroom | pull cord reaching down to around 20 cm from the floor |
Door and furniture handles should operate with one hand, without twisting the wrist and without a pinch grip: levers, bars, finger pulls. It has little effect on cost and a big effect on usability, and it’s worth extending to every room.
How much it costs to furnish an accessible room, and how it fits in
The increase is smaller than people fear, and the room doesn’t “show” it. On the furniture side alone, it’s roughly in the order of 10-20% on the pieces affected, because the work involved is non-standard without being complex: different heights, open recesses, lowered rails, recessed plinths. What really adds cost is the bathroom, for the building and plumbing work involved, which falls outside the furniture supply.
As for appearance, a bed at the right height, a wall-hung worktop and a lever handle are design choices that no guest reads as medical aids. The finishes, colours and formal language stay the same as in the other rooms; what changes are the dimensions.
There’s one last misunderstanding left, and it’s the one that undoes all the previous work: thinking accessibility stops at the room threshold. A perfect room reachable only after two steps in the lobby is no use to anyone. The reception desk needs a lowered section with a worktop at 75-80 cm, clear height underneath of at least 70 cm, a clear width of at least 90 cm and a clear depth of 60 cm, designed together with the rest of the desk rather than added on to the side afterwards. In the breakfast room, at least one table at 75-80 cm is needed, with an open space underneath and no low perimeter rails.
All of this gets decided during the site survey, when the real room is measured and the layout is chosen before any furniture is drawn: it’s the opening stage of furniture design, and it matters more for an accessible room than anywhere else.
Frequently asked questions about accessible hotel rooms
How many accessible rooms must a hotel have?
There’s no uniform minimum number at national level: it depends on regional legislation for accommodation businesses and on the property’s classification, with some regions using bands based on the number of rooms and others using percentages. Law 13/1989 and DM 236/1989 set the technical requirements, not the count.
How much space is needed around the bed?
On at least one long side you need a clearance of at least 90 cm, which allows the wheelchair to draw up alongside and enables a lateral transfer. In practice, 110-120 cm is recommended, which also leaves room for a companion. At one useful point in the room, the 150 cm turning circle needs to be maintained.
What height should the top of the bed be at?
Between 45 and 50 cm from the floor with the mattress fitted, that is, at the height of a wheelchair seat, so the transfer happens without any change in level. With a 20-22 cm mattress, the base sits between 25 and 30 cm. With a mobile hoist, at least 15 cm of clear space is needed under the bed.
What should the wardrobe be like?
The hanging rail should be brought down to 110-120 cm from the floor, either with a fixed lowered rail or with a pull-down rail fitted to the higher one. Useful shelving should be concentrated between 40 and 130 cm. Bar handles that can be gripped with a full hand are needed, with no protruding plinth and, where the passage is narrow, sliding doors.
What dimensions should the washbasin unit have?
A worktop at 80-85 cm from the floor, clear height under the front edge of at least 70 cm and clear depth of at least 60 cm, to allow the wheelchair to approach frontally. No pedestals, floor-standing units or traps protruding at the front, protected hot pipework, and long-lever taps.
Can I trust the door width shown on the drawings?
No, that’s the nominal size. What matters is the clear opening, that is, the actual passage with the door open at 90 degrees, reduced by the frame, the rebate and the thickness of the door. To get 80 cm clear you generally need a door with a nominal size of 90 cm; for access to the unit, the requirement is 85 cm clear.
Does the reception desk need to be accessible?
Yes, with a lowered section built into the desk: worktop at 75-80 cm, clear height underneath of at least 70 cm, clear width of at least 90 cm, clear depth of 60 cm. It should be designed together with the rest of the desk, because a shelf tacked onto the side afterwards works badly and looks visibly bolted on.
How much extra does it cost to furnish an accessible room?
On the furniture side alone, the increase is modest, roughly in the order of 10-20% on the pieces affected: the work involved is non-standard without being complex, meaning different heights, open recesses, lowered rails and recessed plinths. The bathroom adds more cost, because of the building and plumbing work involved.
