Background

Orla has 29 years’ experience in Design for All, providing hands-on consultancy and operational management across a number of areas, notably access, housing, transport, and personal mobility.

Before Tilting the Lens, Orla was at Disability Action, the largest pan-disability organisation in Northern Ireland, and worked alongside a number of high-level executive and regulatory bodies. She has a wealth of experience in accessible co-design, and in developing and applying technical standards for buildings, health, education and transport. 

She established the Disability Housing Forum (DHF), the first of its kind in Northern Ireland that promoted collaboration between housing practitioners and disabled people in order to impact policy and design. 

Orla was Project Manager of the ONSIDE project, a cross-border project created to address the inequality experienced by disabled people in Ireland and Northern Ireland. It enables people to embrace digital connectivity as a first step toward becoming more involved in their communities of choice.

“I was drawn to Tilting the Lens because the company’s ethos of best practice in co-design, and meaningful engagement with disabled people, matches my own principles. The broad range of work where we get to influence our clients is exciting, and I love being part of a team that is pushing the boundaries toward a future world that is inclusive of and for everyone.”

Role at Tilting the Lens

Orla’s focus is on accessible design in the built environment; she is hugely knowledgeable about global accessibility standards and international law and, importantly, how to interpret technical best practices into the actual built environment. 

This includes being able to address potentially conflicting access accommodations in a pragmatic way. It also includes the practical application of innovative, inclusive solutions to enable disabled people to have equity in the workplace.

Orla also helps develop policy, and delivers training so that clients can take her expertise forward and apply it beyond the immediate project. Co-design is always at the heart of her process.

In Orla's words

What’s your definition of accessibility? 

I believe that accessibility is fundamental to every aspect of life and society. Good or bad access can influence every aspect of an individual’s life. 

What change do you want to see in the world? 

I want to see a world where everyone has choice, and that those choices are respected and enabled.

What does success look like to you?

I think that success will be when access and inclusion is considered as a primary and integral consideration across all areas of society: in education, training and employment, arts and culture, sports and leisure, housing, transport, retail and product design.  

What’s one thing about your work that you wish more people understood?

I wish that more people understood that accessibility and inclusion is not a done deal; the legislation and regulations that are in place across the globe are a minimum standard that should be considered as a jumping-off point to be exceeded, and not the target. 

Achievements and honours

  • 1998: PG Certificate Health, Safety and Welfare at Work (UCD)
  • 1996: PG Diploma Landscape Design (Newcastle upon Tyne)
  • 1992: PG Diploma Town and Country Planning (QUB)
  • 1991:  BSc (Hons) Environmental Planning (QUB)

Orla is a former member of a number of strategic alliances and partnerships, including: 

  • Active Living No Limits
  • Inclusive Sports Facilities Advisory Group
  • Arts Council of Northern Ireland: Promoting Access Group, and the Ministerial Advisory Group
  • British Standards Institute Committee B/559
  • Northern Ireland Building Regulations Advisory Committee 

Orla's case studies