What is a Woman-Centric Home?
Woman-Centric Home Design is based on customer feedback, primarily from women from all over the United States, focusing on increased livability and style. Our designers listened to customers describe design shortcomings these women would change if they could as well as describing problems they wished there was an answer for. Many of the resulting Woman-Centric design solutions and amenities have become recognized as being today’s “must have” design features!
Woman-Centric Origins
It all began in mid-air on a flight back to Omaha in January 2003 when the president of Design Basics was reading an article in Forbes magazine about the impact of female consumers – an “Ah-ha!” moment. If women are making the decisions in most of the purchases, then designing around the attributes that actually matter to women is key.
Later that same year, Design Basics launched a publication called Her Home™ Magazine, targeted to women home buyers/owners, which was the catalyst behind two years of extensive research on how women make buying decisions.
In 2006, Design Basics launched a new division called Woman-Centric Matters!® and began training businesses on how to effectively design and market homes using the Woman-Centric approach. A unique bundle of products and services were developed to support the Woman-Centric Matters! brand, available exclusively to companies that choose to become certified with the brand. (You can find Certified Woman-Centric Companies on our "Find a Builder" page.)
Designing from a Woman's Perspective
Our Woman-Centric approach takes home design to a whole new level. Beyond square footage, number of bedrooms, or home style, Woman-Centric home design considers how a home lives and specific buyer preferences. Through our extensive research we developed two unique approaches to designing from a woman’s perspective:
Livability at a Glance™
Women told us there are four primary ‘lenses’ they use when looking at a home and its suitability for her household. This led Design Basics to introduce Livability at a Glance and color-code our floor plans to make it even easier to envision how the home lives. These areas are identified as: Entertaining, De-Stressing, Storing, and Flexibility. Take our Livability Quiz to find out which lenses are most desirable to you and your household.
Finally About Me®
Taking a Woman-Centric approach to residential design and building just makes sense. But obviously not all women are the same. Design Basics’ research identified there are actually four primary ‘personas’ that better describe and predict an individual’s preferences when it comes to a home – its design and products featured. To make it easier to remember, Design Basics even named the four personas! Knowing which persona best describes you can save you and your builder many hours in getting just the right home plan and product selections for your home. Take our Finally About Me Quiz today!