Learners and people at Portland College are shaping the future of independent living for those with complex needs.

The Mansfield college is working in partnership with ADS Independent Living Solutions (ADS) to launch the first Smile Homes® installation on campus.

The innovative project delivers a new standard in sustainable, intelligent buildings for independent living for people with complex needs, from learning to physical disabilities, across all ages.

Smile Homes® are constructed off-site and delivered as a fully-completed personalised homes.

The buildings come pre-fitted with a technology backbone to make the homes clever enough to help look after the health and wellbeing of the people living in them, with the flexibility to support those with different needs on be as independent as they can.

The first unit installed at Portland, co-funded by Innovate UK, the UK’s research and innovation agency, will be used as a living lab and to demonstrate its flexible technology infrastructure, which can support a range of systems for integrated building, environment, and personal management.

Portland learners and citizens will have the opportunity to test this innovative new way of independent living and provide feedback on their experience to help shape future developments of the Smile Homes®.
Smile Homes® have the capacity to add personalised assistive technology, driven by the needs of the people who will live in them.

They can be programmed to function as the users need, creating a person-centred system to support routines and sensory needs with multi-sensors to constantly assess environment, physical and behavioural aspects, while keeping data in the home for privacy and security.

David Adams, chief executive of ADS, said, “Our intelligent Smile Homes® system is a transformational change in the delivery of personalised homes for independent living for people with different abilities and complex needs.

“We are looking forward to using this platform to drive innovation and delivery to enable people to lead fulfilling and rewarding lives in a home of their own, in a community of their choosing, which meets their needs and wishes.”

Dr Mark Dale, principal and chief executive at Portland, added: “Smile Homes® is a fantastic example of exploiting technology to address major health, social and well-being issues, bringing innovation to the challenges of building fully-accessible housing for people with disabilities and a range of medical conditions, using environmentally-sustainable technology.

“We’re proud to be hosting the first Smile Homes® unit on campus and are looking forward to being involved in shaping the future of independent living.”