Diehl Aviation’s award-winning aircraft lavatory innovation, Space³, is slated to enter revenue service with an undisclosed airline before the end of the year, introducing important new accessibility features for Persons with Reduced Mobility (PRM) while bolstering cabin efficiency on twin-aisle aircraft. The nose-to-tail aircraft system supplier and integrator also reveals that it’s now developing a version of Space³ for narrowbodies.
Designed to increase capacity by up to four seats on a widebody aircraft without compromising on accessibility, and compliant with US DOT regulations, the modular Space³ concept, when in PRM mode, enables the merging of two lateral lavatories into one spacious room via a central door to facilitate an onboard wheelchair.
Space³ last year laudably took home a Crystal Cabin Award in the Accessibility category. But in the last 12 months, Diehl Aviation has made several key improvements to the design, company chief project lead for upgrade solutions Mathies Gereke told Runway Girl Network at this year’s Aircraft Interiors Expo in Hamburg.
“The changes we implemented since last year, when you saw the mockup” at AIX 2025, are “ongoing due to the development with the customer,” Gereke said. “So we have bifold doors opening outward now, which is a change because, in the standard configuration, when the center wall is in between, you have a much wider entry and exit area than before,” he explained, while demoing Space³ in PRM mode.
“We have changed the mechanism to a less complex and less visible one for the passengers,” Gereke continued. And indeed, this is the iteration that Diehl Aviation’s first Space³ airline customer “is going to operate,” he said.
Taking feedback last year from AIX 2025 attendees, including Disabled travelers with lived experiences, Diehl Aviation has since reduced the angle on the slight ramp in front of the side-by-side lavatories “from 35 degrees, which was industry standard, to 13 degrees,” so it’s much easier for a crew member or the PRM’s companion to pull the aisle chair into the space and assist before stepping out of the lavatory. The bifold doors can then snap and slide back into place to ensure privacy.
Other subtle improvements have been made. A lower grab bar is oriented to ensure that Disabled passengers with upper body strength have the ability to push up.
Gereke told RGN that Diehl Aviation will deliver Space³ to its customer by this summer “and then they need to build it into” their aircraft. “They’re doing a full blown retrofit. So you know how programs can take a little bit longer or not, but their goal is, since it’s their anniversary this year, they want to get it into service,” he divulged.
Several airlines are celebrating anniversaries this year. The Space³ launch customer has not yet been announced, but we understand that the local aviation authority overseeing the retrofit is ensuring that US DOT requirements are met.
Accessible lavatories have been required by the US DOT on twin-aisle aircraft for decades. And in 2023, the DOT announced a new rule covering narrowbody aircraft.
In addition to mandating certain lavatory design provisions in the near-term, such as the installation of accessible grab bars, faucets, door locks and a visual privacy barrier aboard new single-aisle aircraft with 125 seats or more, the rule ultimately requires that at least one fully accessible lavatory be available on new aircraft. The space must be of sufficient size to permit an individual with a disability and an assistant, equivalent in size to a 95th percentile male (roughly 225 lbs) to maneuver within as necessary to use all lavatory facilities in a closed space that affords privacy equivalent to that afforded to ambulatory users. It must also be large enough for an individual with a disability to approach, enter and leave the lavatory using the aircraft’s onboard wheelchair.
This language from the DOT is helping to drive industry change, with Gereke revealing that Diehl Aviation is presently “developing concepts and working on concepts for narrowbodies as well that meet the DOT requirements.”
“And this,” is said of Space³ “is one thing we can transition to a single-aisle lavatory.”
Long before any DOT action, Diehl Aviation dedicated resources to improving the air travel experience for PRMs, and it continues to do so. The Laupheim, Germany-headquartered company developed a prior-gen concept for narrowbodies that transforms two side-by-side lavs into one larger-footprint space for PRMs. And it just won a 2026 Crystal Cabin Award in the Accessibility category for its AURS (Adaptive User Routing System) for sensory impaired travelers.
“It’s something we have done for a long time and we try to continue to develop that further and further,” Diehl Aviation CEO Dr. Jörg Schuler told RGN during an in-depth sit-down interview at AIX 2026.
But in light of the DOT’s new accessible lav rule for narrowbodies, the Tier 1 aviation supplier is seeing even more interest from airlines for accessible lavs, Dr. Schuler confirmed.
“Space³ is a lavatory dedicated to one specific airline, but others are already asking [about it.]. So, I’m pretty sure that that concept will find its way in many aircraft, because also the OEMs have started to be interested in that concept. The momentum is there. It’s rolling,” he assured.
Dr. Schuler is also edified by the work that’s now jointly afoot by Airbus and Boeing to develop a tactile placard standard for aircraft, which Diehl Aviation will incorporate into its designs.
“It’s important to find a common standard, rules, so that the end passenger who wears the impairment [can navigate]. I think that’s the most important and what we are looking for. And I think we are nicely on the forefront in some of these elements, and if this finds a broader interest in OEMs, in airlines, I would be more than happy,” he said.
Related Articles:
• Boeing and Airbus develop tactile placard standard for aircraft
• Why aviation sustainability and accessibility are interconnected
• Accessible air travel solutions go mainstream at AIX 2025
• US DOT’s expanded lav rule for narrowbodies still a decade away
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