Over the last few years, weighted blankets have become more popular and mainstream, with a huge amount of great reviews from users. More and more companies are coming out with their own varieties of weighted blankets, and mainstream media are promoting the benefits of weighted blankets for trouble sleeping, anxiety and stress.

What many people don’t know is that they were originally created for people with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). While weighted blankets may originally start out as a product designed for people with ASD, they have now evolved into much more than that. Even as little as five years ago you would have been lucky to find even a single person that was either using weighted blankets or talking about them.

It was in 2018 that weighted blankets really started to take off after this article written by Ashley Fetters went viral on the internet. In the article, author Ashley Fetters wrote about the many benefits of weighted blankets and why they were becoming so popular as a sleep aid. The article also delved into the topic of whether it’s okay for people without developmental problems to take advantage of products which weren’t originally intended or designed for them.

The brilliance of weighted blankets is that they are truly a universal design product. Many people that live with a disability promote the universal design approach to tackling products. Universal designs of products which not only help someone with a disability but also improve the lives of everyone that comes into contact with them.

Universal design is also sometimes referred to as ‘curb-cut effect.’ Something that was originally designed to benefit a specific group ultimately ends up benefiting everyone. By making weighted blankets cheaper and more readily available, it will ultimately end up benefiting a larger group of people.