Designing for the Life Span Segment 4
Designing for the Life Span Segment 4 
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[D]
The kitchen poses significant problems in this regard since access to stored cooking utensils, food stuffs and kitchenware is necessary throughout the day. Over time, people change in their ability to bend and reach. Physiological changes and the onset of osteoarthritis make it difficult to reach up high or bend down low to access storage. Storage inexorably gravitates to a "belt-line" at counter surface level with all such surfaces crowded with those items of daily use that are ordinarily put away.
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For many older adults confront the problems of pain, in coordination and dizziness in the early mornings and in the evenings - the primary times when there is food preparation. Reaching down to find supplies, cooking utensils, cleaning agents and other paraphernalia becomes difficult. Reaching above to high cabinets is equally difficult. For this reason, stored food stuffs and other items including cookware may actually be left out on counters. Additionally, items in view are items that don't fall away from memory.
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