Boundary and skin
Door
housingschoolretailpublic building
An opening in a wall for passing from one side to the other, with a leaf that opens and closes.
What it solves
It controls the passage of people, air, light and noise. A wide door with no change in level lets everyone in, including wheelchair users.
Today
Provide a comfortable clear width for a wheelchair, with no step at the threshold. Protect the entrance from the rain with an eave or a porch. In a hot climate a door with louvers or a transom ventilates even when closed.
Common mistake
Placing the main door without rain protection or with a step that blocks strollers and wheelchairs.
Tomorrow
Wide, light doors with lever handles let an older person keep entering their home on their own. Reclaimed timber leaves and repairable hardware extend their life.
Where it comes from
- 1Ancient Egypt Nile Valley, Antiquity
The oldest recorded doors appear in tomb paintings, and tombs also had false doors leading to the afterlife. - 2Neolithic settlements near Zurich, Switzerland, more than 5,000 years ago
Archaeologists found two doors of that age, among the oldest that survive. - 3Sui dynasty China, 604 to 618
For Emperor Yang’s library, the first automatic door activated by foot was made. - 4Swahili coast Zanzibar, Tanzania, 19th century
Carved timber doors, round-arched in the Indian style or rectangular in the Omani style, sometimes with bronze studs.
Appears in the routes
See also
Also in Boundary and skin
Diagrams and texts by LDB Arquitectura. They are shared under the CC BY 4.0 license, which allows them to be used and adapted with credit to the source.