We continue our series on Accessibility in the Lab – each episode explores the importance of accessibility in the lab, academia, the workforce and other applications.
Our guest for this episode is Marilee Lloyd, AIA, who is the National Leader for Laboratory Planning at HED, one of the oldest and largest architecture firms in the US. Lloyd has over 37 years of experience managing and designing multifaceted projects for pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, vivaria, clinical laboratories and hospitals, science education facilities and product development laboratories, and is well-respected for her passion and strategic design skills.
Listen as we discuss best practices for laboratory designs and diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) considerations in design.
For a transcript of this episode, please visit this episode's page on Buzzsprout.
Key Learning Points:
Stay connected with SLAS:
About SLAS:
SLAS (Society for Laboratory Automation and Screening) is an international professional society of academic, industry and government life sciences researchers and the developers and providers of laboratory automation technology. The SLAS mission is to bring together researchers in academia, industry and government to advance life sciences discovery and technology via education, knowledge exchange and global community building. For more information about SLAS, visit www.slas.org.
SLAS publishes two peer-reviewed and MEDLINE-indexed scientific journals, SLAS Discovery and SLAS Technology. For more information about SLAS and its journals, visit slas.org
Upcoming SLAS Events:
SLAS Europe 2024 Conference and Exhibition
SLAS 2024 Microscale Innovation in Life Sciences Symposium
SLAS 2024 Sample Management Symposium
SLAS 2024 Data Sciences and AI Symposium
We continue our series on Accessibility in the Lab – each episode explores the importance of accessibility in the lab, academia, the workforce and other applications.
Our guest for this episode is Marilee Lloyd, AIA, who is the National Leader for Laboratory Planning at HED, one of the oldest and largest architecture firms in the US. Lloyd has over 37 years of experience managing and designing multifaceted projects for pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, vivaria, clinical laboratories and hospitals, science education facilities and product development laboratories, and is well-respected for her passion and strategic design skills.
Listen as we discuss best practices for laboratory designs and diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) considerations in design.
For a transcript of this episode, please visit this episode's page on Buzzsprout.
Key Learning Points:
Stay connected with SLAS:
About SLAS:
SLAS (Society for Laboratory Automation and Screening) is an international professional society of academic, industry and government life sciences researchers and the developers and providers of laboratory automation technology. The SLAS mission is to bring together researchers in academia, industry and government to advance life sciences discovery and technology via education, knowledge exchange and global community building. For more information about SLAS, visit www.slas.org.
SLAS publishes two peer-reviewed and MEDLINE-indexed scientific journals, SLAS Discovery and SLAS Technology. For more information about SLAS and its journals, visit slas.org
Upcoming SLAS Events:
SLAS Europe 2024 Conference and Exhibition
SLAS 2024 Microscale Innovation in Life Sciences Symposium
SLAS 2024 Sample Management Symposium
SLAS 2024 Data Sciences and AI Symposium
Hannah Rosen:
Hello everyone and welcome to New Matter, the SLAS podcast where we interview life science luminaries. I'm your host, Hannah Rosen, and today we are continuing our series discussing accessibility in the lab. Joining me today is Marilee Lloyd, senior lab architect at HED. Marilee is here to talk to us about designing lab spaces with diversity, equity, and inclusion in mind. So, welcome Marilee.
Marilee Lloyd:
Hi there. Nice to be here.
Hannah Rosen:
Nice to have you. So to start us off, can you just kind of provide us with a little bit of your professional background and what you do at HED?
Marilee Lloyd:
Sure. I am our national leader for laboratory planning. I am an architect and I have been in practice for 37 or more years, so I have been at this a bit. I have been fortunate enough to work in a variety of life science spaces both in education and in institutional corporate kind of settings. So I've done both teaching laboratory environments, research laboratories in education environments and research laboratories in corporate and institutional environments. So, broad range. But all of it has, you know, it's some similarities, some strong differences, and it's about knowing which kind of pieces of the toolkit to bring out when you need to.
Hannah Rosen:
Yeah, fantastic. I'm sure having so much experience in all different types of labs really kind of helps you because you have the full picture of every type of lab from he education to the industry. That's really fantastic, yeah. So can you talk a little bit about, you know, what do we mean when we say diversity, equity and inclusion? And then, you know, people might be surprised, they don't automatically think architecture when they hear these terms. So can you talk a little bit about how does this relate to what you do?
Marilee Lloyd:
I see the science environment, I talk about it in terms of what I call the divergent laboratory. Here at HED, the conversation is sort of between ourselves as the laboratory planners and our workplace folks, we create a whole environment, right? It's about that experience of moving through space and working either in the lab or at a desk, or in a collaboration zone, having lunch. All of those kinds of things can be supportive of diversity and inclusion, and the architecture sort of creates this platform, and I think about it in science and we think about it in the workplace, it's a supportive platform, it allows people to be more inclusive to support diverse peoples. That could be as simple as having gender inclusive restrooms. It could be as simple as providing a quiet space for someone to collect themselves, it is all sorts of things like that that just support the environment, create an environment that is open, collaborative and engaging.
Hannah Rosen:
Yeah, that's fantastic. I love that and just one of those things of like, you don't think about it, but then as soon as you say it like, it makes so much sense, you know?
Marilee Lloyd:
Yeah, yeah. And a lot of the engagement sort of across our disciplines makes for that environment and that includes our mechanical and electrical partners too, because if we can make that environment more supportive, even to the point of how the lighting works, and allowing someone with visual impairments to be able to see better and control their environment, that improves space. That makes that space better for that individual. So it is shifting our thought process as designers and honestly as the clients we work with and talking about these spaces a little different.
Hannah Rosen:
And it does also, you know, it seems like a lot of these things, and this comes back to when we did our first series on accessibility in the lab, you know, one of the things that we talked about a lot is, you know, just because you don't require these accommodations doesn't mean that they're not nice to have, even if you don't like, for example, you're saying that, you know, quiet space to to collect yourself. You know, I'm sure for a neurodivergent person that might be a must have, but even for somebody who is not neurodivergent like, I know how many times would I like to just have a quiet place where I could go and collect myself, even if I don't, I don't need it. It's still just so nice to have it.
Marilee Lloyd:
Absolutely. We all have those days and we, you know, that we need to take a moment, everybody has them, you know, let's just be honest about it and, you know, in terms of accessibility, that works in the lab environment, having space for someone who has a mobility challenge also gives you space to move materials. So understanding how to talk about these spaces and frame the conversation makes it a better space. Having an adjustable bench, and we talk a lot about flexibility and adaptability and being able to raise and lower shelves and bench height, is one of those things. Now we can do that and provide a space that is at the right height for mobility challenged person, but there's also people that need to stand, so being able to raise it, you know, we can't always think in terms of what about someone in a wheelchair. It's not just about that. It's someone who has a hip or a back problem who needs to stand, and maybe that's only for a couple of months, but we can accommodate it.
Hannah Rosen:
And if you build the space with that in mind already, then it becomes very easy when you have these temporary situations to accommodate for that because you're already prepared if a situation like that comes up.
Marilee Lloyd:
Right, right. And frankly, that works for a variety of instruments too. There are some instrument stacks where it works very well to be able to lower the bench significantly and stack the instrument. So why does that have to just serve that single purpose? It can help a mobility challenged person too.
Hannah Rosen:
Yeah, a little bit of the just like, thinking outside the box and utilizing what we're already doing, right, is great. Could you talk a little bit more about, you know, reasons why it's so important for us to be thinking about DEI concepts in the lab?
Marilee Lloyd:
Well, I think the broad conversation about who's included in STEM and science environments, science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and I would argue the arts as well. So I think there's a big component to understanding the whole idea. You see more in higher education about STEAM that, aside bringing women, people of color, people who have a variety of mobility challenges, neurodivergent challenges, people who view gender differently, bringing those people into science means that we will investigate things better and more broadly. There's been a bunch of things written about that. For example, a lot of medications weren't always designed for women, for size, for how their metabolism works. Same is true of other different peoples, epecially people who are on a neurodivergent spectrum or have different gender ideas and how their systems based on medications they may or may not be taking react. So understanding all that and bringing that to the science and research environment is critical for us to get better both as a people and how we interact with others and for our research and pushing forward in the science environment. That was a long-winded answer.
Hannah Rosen:
No, but it's one of those things that I feel like we keep saying it and it doesn't sink in with people of like, why are we making decisions about people, you know, without consulting the people who are being affected essentially like, you know, why are we deciding what, you know, certain race or gender, or you know, group of people needs without asking them, you know, we just decide what... look from the outside and think that we know best and it just, we miss so much because you just don't know what you don't know.
Marilee Lloyd:
Right. Focusing on bringing those people into that, the science environment and making it, and again this starts in education. And it's about drawing them forward into the pipeline. If they don't feel as though they can become a principal investigator at a major research institution, or a technician within a lab environment, if they don't feel that that possibility is out there, if that environment isn't set as a place they can go, then we have missed out on that opportunity as the creators of that environment. Architects and engineers have that responsibility of making the world around them, their environment, more supportive and at least having those conversations with our clients and engaging them and saying hey, have you thought about this?
Hannah Rosen:
Yeah, and it kind of ties in, I think, with my next question, which is, you know, I think when we talk about this concept of accessibility, people usually immediately come to mind like, physical disabilities, how do we accommodate people with physical disabilities? And so I would love if you can talk more about, you know, where we've already started talking about it a little bit, but like, what are some of these principles of DEI that you see, are really being neglected when we view accessibility primarily through the lens of physical disabilities?
Marilee Lloyd:
I think we've touched on both neurodivergent needs, and that may be for that quiet place, that may be for control of one's environment, don't impact others as much. And that can be control of the breeze in a space, the smell in a space, the lighting, goodness there's a tremendous amount written about how fluorescent lighting, which thankfully we are moving away from a little bit, can trigger a migraine, and that can also be a problem for neurodivergent people, so understanding and being able to now with LED lighting, you can control the warmth or cool of the visual lighting spectrum. So that means that, that might be helpful for some people, it's also helpful in science to be able to view results appropriately. Basic things like the color of the bench top, I'm sure anyone listening now is visualizing laboratory and they're thinking about a black countertop. Yeah, it does not have to be black. There's a lot of, you know, grays, you can even get a variety of colors now. They tend to get a little bit more expensive as you diverge from, you know, your basic black. But that allows one, the researcher to have a little bit more, for example, you want a lighter countertop if you're dealing with a dark particle. If you're looking at something that's dark, the converse is also true, but a gray counter allows someone looking at a white paper, less glare. And so the visual difference in the colors is not as great. So it can help an individual and again small thing, really small thing, but that allows your eyes to settle just a little bit, especially when you're looking through a microscope and then going to look at a bench top.
And by the way, this makes me think of another thing that we kind of need to throw into the conversation and that's having the ability to look, and I'm looking up through my two windows here and outside. Not every lab space could or should have daylight. There are some things that absolutely need that sort of control where you should be able to fully darken a room. However, being able to look outside and see green, or blue sky, or even gray sky if that happens to be where you're at. So you can see the weather, you can see the change, you can see the seasons. That's super important. And to everyone's psychology. And that's not just for a neurodivergent person, that is for any one of us. And I think too long we have neglected that and not pulled those biophilic elements into our space and that's something we here at HED lead and are part of our conversation. And I think at a lot of architectural and engineering firms now it's part of how we think about things.
Hannah Rosen:
I'm very curious because, you know, there are some of the things that you mentioned there of, things that are desirable to be able to control in the environment. And one of the things that you mentioned was smell, and it just made me think that I can only imagine, you know, especially in a lab, there are some things, and smell in particular, that must be so difficult to control. You know, you can only do so much, so I'm curious, you know, what are some of the tactics that you take to help control and adjust some of these elements that really seem like they just kind of come with the territory of working in a lab?
Marilee Lloyd:
Well, there are a lot of tools, it's picking the right one at the right time. A lot of work with hazardous chemicals, which happens in a lot of labs, and has to happen in a fume hood. That environment is specifically created to move the air back and away. Same is true of, we've got a variety of different devices, like a fume hood, a laminar flow hood, a biological safety cabinet which are all designed for different needs to create a safe, productive environment. You could also have a variety of things like a backdraft that pulls the air directly away, and that can be built into a wall system. We can pull the air down, we can use a snorkel, we can do a variety of things, slow the movement of the air so that the environment stays in more control. So there are a variety of things we can do to sort of control that environment that also have to do with the safety and cleanliness of the environment that we need for the lab. So there are a lot of small controls that make a big difference.
Hannah Rosen:
Yeah, that's so interesting. Cause I know for me, you know, whenever I was working in the lab and, you know, you think of the fume hood, and it's always just like, you think of it as a safety mechanism and it never really occurred to me to think of it as also, just like, making the experience less unpleasant of working with these chemicals like formaldehydes that have strong odors. So that's a very interesting perspective as well. And I wonder if you can, because I remember that was something that was always a big thing in the labs that I worked in, especially in grad school, was trying to encourage or force people to use the fume hoods. I don't know why there's always so much resistance to using the fume hood, so you can phrase it as like well, it's not just a safety thing, it's also like just gonna make your life more pleasant.
Marilee Lloyd:
It really is. And, you know, in the education environment where you have users that are less used to the lab environment and so may be more prone to make an error. We have designed a specific teaching station that has a backdraft panel to it. We call it the Oval Air Station, and that is a terrific way to pull the air, even for stinky stuff, and it's not built to be a replacement for a fume hood or anything like that, but it pulls the air away from the individual doing the experience or that's doing the experiments. We use that Oval Air Station to control the air and make it just a more pleasant environment. And in case that somebody does spill something, it's pulled away from them, and again it makes it a little bit more pleasant environment for people to be in, in an education environment. It's just that one degree more safe and control and I would argue that, you know, for a basic dissection where you're just sort of dealing with stinkies, that is a better way to handle that.
Hannah Rosen:
Yeah, definitely. I'm curious, you know, what are the conversations that you have surrounding cost for a lot of these things cause, you know, we all know that labs are expensive to build, to maintain, here's already so many costs going into the stuff that people view as we need for the experiments themselves. And I wonder, and especially in an academic setting where, like, you know, costs are already an issue and funding is sometimes a real challenge. So, you know, when you're discussing all of these potential options with, you know, people you're designing the lab space for, what is that conversation surrounding and do you have a lot of pushback of, like, well, yeah, sure, that stuff would be nice to have, but we really can't justify the costs associated.
Marilee Lloyd:
Yes, that conversation occurs and it occurs frequently because across the board, certainly in the current environment where inflation is still, you know, maybe coming down, but still a thing both in academic and in the corporate world, there's a lot of pressure to be mindful of costs and it's difficult to get some products too, they're on back order because there is so much demand. So those things all feed into cost increases. So it is part of the conversation and it becomes a balance and understanding that some of these things are a value for their employee base, be that students or faculty or principal investigators or technical staff, and they have the additional incentive these days, to want to do these spaces in order to recruit and bring staff. In so, recruitment is sort of a major pivotal point. A lot of the cost of, for instance, a lighter colored counter, relative cost difference is coming down. And in many cases there is, I'm thinking of counters in particular, there is often something that may be more economically friendly and environmentally friendly that is a better choice that is less expensive. So it is economically friendly as well. Also, thinking in terms of something like a fume hood, you know, adding a fume hood, that's a $7000 addition plus mechanical costs, at least right now for a certain size. But if you talk in terms of, OK, can we better control the environment, and what is our payback in five years, six? It used to be that the payback for doing a designing or specifying a fume hood that is more energy efficient didn't have a payback. Now the energy savings within five years or ten years is such that it's a viable choice and a good choice. And it is, you know, it ultimately will bring down environmental costs for the client in terms of energy costs. So lots of things to talk about in terms of that. In a lot of ways talking to them, being able to recruit new, diverse staff is part of the conversation.
Hannah Rosen:
Yeah, because it does seem more and more universities and colleges are starting to implement their own DEI initiatives and it is something that is starting to become something really at the forefront of what we're thinking about when we're developing spaces and just recruiting in general, as you said.
Marilee Lloyd:
And I am pleased to see that a lot of the incoming students are looking for those sorts of things. You know, asking questions like how do you support me in my background? We have been seeing things like a mother's room, for example, and even calling it a mother's room is something we're stepping away from, just calling it a reflection room or a quiet room, whether that is for a woman, or an individual I should say, who is nursing to be able to go to. Maybe that room also needs to focus as a religious reflection room. And is, you know, is the population of the building large enough to support two of those? You know, talking about those and understanding that there are people with different religious requirements, too. I mean to take our conversation in a slightly different direction. Different people need to step away and take a moment for their religion at different times during the day and supporting that is important, and it's important in all environments and just providing that space is, I think, critical to understand and to backtrack and sort of take a different direction, providing space in a larger building for taking care of having a yoga room, a space for some sort of physical activity depending on the focus and type of the facilities also can be a useful thing just for people's mental state, and that's sort of across the board that can be helpful for anyone to take, you know, to be able to have a place for yoga or meditation or a little bit during the day, or stretching, or running.
Hannah Rosen:
Yeah, it is so interesting because I also think about, you know, having those spaces. And then, you know, this falls outside of your area of responsibility, obviously, but when we make those spaces available, to encourage or let people feel free to use those spaces, I think is something that's very important because I know that there can often be a culture, not just in the, you know, the sciences, but definitely in the sciences there of constantly needing to be producing and not being allowed to step away and so there can be a conflict. I think a lot of the time of like, providing these resources, but then nobody feeling like they have the freedom to actually use them. You know, if you have a yoga room, but then nobody feels like if they step away to go do yoga for, you know, however long, that they're going to be judged either by their peers or by their boss, or, you know, by whomever. And so, yeah, I think that that's sort of something that people need to keep in mind after you've come in and given them all these spaces is that we also need to create that culture of being able to fully utilize.
Marilee Lloyd:
Right, right. And, you know, I think we try very hard to have those conversations and sort of open the doors, I guess, and talk about how these can be useful spaces. And I'm also thinking of a lot of other amenity spaces like a cafe and open collaboration zone to step back into the science sort of aspect of things. Now we're seeing a lot of collaboration and dry research going on since a lot of research can be automated now and the instrument set and can be monitored for from anywhere, whether that instrument is in a hood in a controlled environment or in the lab, also a controlled environment, but less so and sitting on its bench that can be monitored anywhere in that building or anywhere in the world, frankly. And that information shared so more people can see that data from the cloud. So the need for that scientist to be in the lab as much may be changing. So having those spaces where that scientist and their team or other API's can meet in a collaboration zone, offers them that potential for innovation and interaction and making things better and to be able honestly to sit, type up their notes. So there's a lot of actual real work that can happen, iIt just doesn't have to happen in the lab. And in fact, it's better if it doesn't because that space then can be devoted to the lab and other space devoted to collaboration and write up. And you're not spending as much on the expensive space, the laboratory space, you're spending it on a collaboration zone.
Hannah Rosen:
I'm curious with all of this, you know, different space allocation that you're talking about. How does your approach differ when you're designing a lab space where you're essentially creating it from scratch, you're building it from the ground up, you can take all of this into consideration when you're developing the space versus updating a lab that already exists and already has certain constraints on the layout.
Marilee Lloyd:
Well, and I think that is, you know, understanding what dropping back to understanding the floor-to-floor height so we can understand how much ventilation and all that sort of stuff we can actually get in there and improve. Understanding the bay spacing to make sure that, being able to maximize the flexibility. Providing adequate daylight is part of that conversation too. So how do we control both the daylight and give them in that existing building in those existing openings, and how we give them dark enable spaces, which is often the difference between an open lab and segregated and darken able lab support, or a variety of instrumentation. So, you know, how those work we can use parts of the existing building that perhaps don't have as great an access to daylight. For example, in a recent project at Michigan Tech, we used parts of the existing building for our lab support because it was situated and our addition was sort of on one lateral side of the building that all had nice access to daylight. But we were able to leverage the existing building to provide lab support, which was great, darken able spaces for things like tissue culture, like instrumentation, like NMR, all of those sorts of spaces are easily housed in that, and so it's about understanding that environment and using the tools that the existing space gives you to their best advantage and working around the things you need to.
Hannah Rosen:
That's great. It's just, yeah, it's more about repurposing, I guess in some ways with this new information. Like, I just keep thinking about what you're talking about, the access to daylight. When I was in grad school, there was a lab that I had friends in and there was the student, the grad student office didn't have any windows. It was completely in the center of the building, so they actually paint, someone a long time ago had painted a mural of a window on the wall. And so I just keep thinking about that. And so what you would probably do in that situation is like, just completely reorganize the lab space and try to move them to an area of the lab that did have an outward facing wall where they could have then some natural light and then maybe repurpose that room for a purpose where you would need to be able to control the light.
Marilee Lloyd:
And, you know, some of that has complications, right. Because you want to make sure that you get the right ventilation for the laboratory environment and don't sort of make your life more difficult by leveraging that, but you also want to look at it with fresh eyes and think, OK, what does this really want to be? How do we leverage this space best? And have those sort of broader conversations about how they want to use the lab. What are they really doing in there? How much of this is actually going to be lab space? How much of it needs to be lab support space or instrumentation or specific? Is there a component that needs to be cleaner than the other parts of it? What are our air pressurization cascade? How does that all look and how much space do they want to devote to grad students and write up and all that sort of stuff more and more? And remember what 20, 25 years ago the write up space used to be sort of at the end of the line of benches at a window. And while that gave those people window space, which is terrific, it also meant that they couldn't bring a cup of coffee or their lunch into the lab. So moving those spaces out into a separate space where all the graduate students can talk and maybe learn from one another. Same is true with technical staff in an institutional or a corporate environment. They can all talk to each other and learn from each other, you know, hey I figured out this new way to tweak this machine over here. Hey, you wanna see? So that sort of thing. They have their space and maybe it's got the daylight and they can bring a cup of coffee or have their lunch together there. And that means that we can take that space either out of the lab or devote the square footage to the grad students out of it, and so make the controlled environment the lab, just to touch smaller. Or they have more lab space. We're doing productive experiments so, and again that becomes part of the conversation. You know, what do you really do with this lab? What do you want to do with it? What do you think you're gonna do with it in five years? What do you think you're gonna do with it in 10 years? And that helps us understand how much adaptability and flexibility we need to build into it, which leads us back to providing those adaptable and flexible spaces that can work with any body type. And just going.
Hannah Rosen:
So it sounds like a lot of these concepts of, you know, people talk a lot about, you know, universal design now. So it sounds like that plays a big role into your approach.
Marilee Lloyd:
It absolutely does. Whenever we start, especially a teaching laboratory environment, I like to have that conversation with the lab users, the teaching staff, the faculty and say hey, consider this approach. We do all of the counters at about 32, 34 inches, 33 sometimes. So that they are at a universal height, but 34 inches is most common. It is within ADA requirement ranges, so it is accessible to an individual in a world filter but it also is not so far off the stand standard 36 inch high lab countertop. That means we can make all of the spaces the same height in the lab, so no student or faculty member comes in and sees a space, ohh this is where I have to go because that's where this is, you know, that's where my lowered spot is. No one is called out in that way. That principle resonates with people. It has become sort of how we approach this. It is important. Again, getting back to making things inclusive and welcoming to all by providing that, well, level playing field, quite literally, we give that in a very quiet way.
Hannah Rosen:
I'm curious what's your perspective on the effects of this increased prevalence of automation in labs? How has that been impacting the way that you approach DEI in laboratory design?
Marilee Lloyd:
There is only so much we can do about where the controls are located on a piece of instrumentation that faculty have or an entity has purchased, but allowing we talk a lot about the clearance required around it and how they access it, and that enters into the conversation. How that environment really works for them now, there's a lot of conversation about providing the services and support for automated instrumentation. That becomes part of providing that adaptability. Also, those adjustable tables I mentioned make it so that if you do have something that is a larger instrument, you can lower it so that anybody can walk up to it and do the controls within a, you know, a range. If the control is in an awkward spot, it just is going to and there may not always be the ability to get knees under. But we can do things like put aspects on even a wheeled cart so it can be pulled apart so someone can more easily get to a portion of it. Understanding that that has to be balanced with any vibration concerns because when you start moving things around you get into vibration issues. Again, it's part of a conversation. It's about engaging in those conversations.
Hannah Rosen:
So many pieces to consider, but I'm sure just starting the conversation is a huge step forward for this.
Marilee Lloyd:
Right. If you don't start the conversation there is no way to get some of these issues on the table, yeah.
Hannah Rosen:
And I think that that's a great point, is that even if you you look at it and you think you may like, think that there's no way that we can make this accessible so we just shouldn't bother and shouldn't try, and how limiting that is and how even if you don't think it's possible, you know, just ask and find out what it is, and then if it turns out it's not, then maybe yeah contact the manufacturer and let them know because I know that, you know, from the conversations I've had with a lot of the providers that we work with, who presented our conferences, they want that feedback, they value that feedback cause they want to create the best possible product.
Marilee Lloyd:
Absolutely. And a lot of the lab casework manufacturers are very interested and do want to engage in these conversations. And I absolutely don't have any problem with going back to them and saying, look, this is what I'm dealing with, how do we reach a point of accommodation?
Hannah Rosen:
That's great. It's just great how much more open to these concepts people and organizations and companies are becoming. It's really just making it so much easier to have those conversations and then to implement change. It's so great. Well, unfortunately, we're almost out of time. But before we have to wrap up, I just wanted to know is there anything else that you think that people who are, you know, maybe thinking about developing a lab space or working with their current lab space and maybe experiencing some challenges, things that they need to consider or know when they're starting to think about how to incorporate more of these elements into their lab design.
Marilee Lloyd:
You know, I think in a lot of conversations with clients, the stumbling block is one, developing a common language with the AE professionals. So knowing that when I say fume hood, what that instrument is, or that piece of equipment is. It sounds really basic, but often we get people, people are confused between what a fume hood, a laminar flow hood, BSC, different things. And so understanding that common language with what the pieces in the lab are, and don't be afraid to ask questions. It's super important because a client doesn't know what they don't know. We don't know what the client doesn't know. And so part of our, I typically ask a lot of questions and I ask them from different perspectives and different points just so that I can get a variety of data on what they might need. So understand that it is absolutely OK to ask questions of your design professional. Please ask, you know, really do engage with them and understand that if you don't see it on a drawing, it doesn't exist. That sounds kind of odd, but if you are looking at a flat 2D drawing and you don't understand it, ask someone and see if you can get a three-dimensional dictation of the environment. Oftentimes we can do that.
Hannah Rosen:
Fantastic. Well, Marilee, thank you so much for joining me today, this has been a really fascinating conversation and I'm so happy that we've been able to continue our discussions around accessibility in the lab, which is such an important topic. And so I really appreciate you coming and sharing your expertise and I hope that, you know, you're open to us keeping this conversation going in the future.
Marilee Lloyd:
I love it. Would absolutely love it. It's the thing we need to do.