I was born profoundly deaf but my parents only found out when I was 18 months old. I had a language and speech delay as a result. When I was 11, I learned sign language and was able to go to a mainstream boarding school with a deaf unit but there were no other students like me. I couldn’t follow the lessons, so I had my own teaching assistant. My parents fought our local council to send me to a state-funded boarding school for the deaf and it changed everything for me. The environment was inclusive by design: classrooms were horseshoe shaped so that students could see each other and the teachers, who were specifically teachers of the deaf. I wouldn’t be where I am today if it weren’t for that school.

My experience at school showed me the importance of an inclusively designed space. It also taught me the power of language: I use the word “deaf”, with a lowercase “d”, to refer to hearing loss, while “Deaf”, with an uppercase “D”, denotes a rich cultural and linguistic identity. With these lessons in mind, I decided to start Deafcity Hub, a co-working and cultural space for the Deaf community in London. While there are a multitude of co-working spaces for creatives and the net-zero community, there is a shortage of those designed specifically for Deaf people. The hub will be a best-practice model for accessible and inclusive urban spaces. It will be our own Deaf version of Wework, bringing together Deaf-run businesses and showcasing cultural programming every month, including creative workshops and British Sign Language classes.

This isn’t the first time that a group has attempted to open a Deaf-inclusive space. About 40 years ago, there was meant to be an International Deaf Cultural Centre at London King’s Cross. It never happened but my 15 years of built-environment experience has taught me that now is the right time to try again. Deafcity Hub will open a pilot space in central London in 2027. If this goes well, our plan is to expand to five regions globally.

The hub will be built using Deaf space-design principles from Gallaudet University in Washington: the only university in the world specifically designed for Deaf and hard-of-hearing students. These include better acoustics, round tables and opaque rather than glass walls. The hallways also need to be wider as, when you are communicating with a Deaf person or lip-reading a hearing person, you have to be side by side. All these principles are also beneficial to the wider disabled community.

There is no building code in the UK that addresses the needs of Deaf people, apart from putting a T-loop in reception areas and basic sound insulation between walls. I find it shocking that, in public spaces, Deaf people are overwhelmed by distracting noise. If the lighting is poor, I’m not able to lip-read, which inhibits communication and blocks me from being part of the conversation.

Deafcity Hub’s pilot space will bring this vibrant community back into the conversation. As we campaign for our permanent home, we’re thinking ahead to our next goals: opening a theatre and cinema that provide captions for every film and show.

To hear more from Deafcity Hub founder Amanprit Arnold about how differently the Deaf community experience cities, tune in to ‘The Urbanist’ on Monocle Radio.

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