The first time I came to visit my friend’s off campus apartment was at night when there was no longer natural light coming in through the windows. After a lovely dinner, I really had to use the restroom, and given that it was dark outside, began searching for the light switch. I am accustomed to odly placed light switches; however, this one was impossible to find. Finally, my friends noticed how much I was struggling and told me that the switch was all the way on the far wall of the bathroom.

My friend’s bathroom is overall poorly designed; however, the greatest design flaw is easily the horrendous positioning of the light switch. The bathroom is already abnormally long, meaning you have to walk all the way to the far end of the bathroom to turn on the light, then walk back to close the door, and back across to the toilet.

This feels particularly flawed, as the bathroom is such a high traffic room, and is often used at night, meaning you have to negotiate your way through the dark to find the light switch. I have already been in the apartment countless more times when someone new comes to visit and, like me, inevitably asks where the switch is after spending an inordinate amount of time searching all the typical locations for it. As a result, the light is frequently left on constantly, wasting an unnecessary amount of electricity.

When thinking about how designs are often analyzed, it seems the only relevant factor for a bathroom light switch is intuitive location, and yet this switch’s location is shockingly unintuitive, leaving it with no redeeming qualities.