The Popular Choice Awards

For more than 25 years Integracja has been combating with every type of barriers against people with disabilities and reduced mobility.
Nowadays we are an experts in architectural, social and web-based accessibility. Within the scope of architecture solutions and design, we are concerned about creating friendly public spaces for every person with reduced mobility. For last 5 years, we have been trying to convince the Polish Real Estate Market to think more about diversity, inclusion, and accessibility of the new investments in Poland more than just on a basic level. We are trying to show that disability is not only connected with people on wheelchairs. Our mission is also to educate and show the very best practice in universal design and architectural accessibility. We started in 2009 and until September 2020 we have certified over 300 buildings in Poland. It means that the impact increased from year to year with more developers/investors currently involved in a movement of positive change, not only in office market but also in residential, retail and hotel. Recently we hear and speak a lot about wellbeing and placemaking in the construction and development sectors. One of the major challenges in today’s investment process and mixed-use projects is to meet the requirements and needs off all potential users of the space. The target group is very diverse. Our activities are focused on inclusion and universal design which means that we do not only think about disabilities but also about elderly people, parents with children, people with temporarily reduced mobility and tourists with heavy and oversized luggage. Our large experience shows that we need to take them under consideration at every stage of the project. As soon as possible. With every building (office, retail, residential, hotel) the accessibility means also the possibility of hiring people with disabilities (which is obligatory for Polish companies hiring more than 25 people). Our mission is also to teach sensibility and provide training on how to serve a customer with disability. It is connected with combating website limitations for people with disabilities and introducing WCAG 2.1 (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines) solutions too. We have been working with plenty of companies and institutions in order to adapt their projects, buildings, commercial centers, public spaces into a condition, which is acceptable for people with various needs.