Transgenerational Design Matters is a non-profit design, education and research organization that helps companies, businesses and individuals design, evaluate, and promote consumer products and residential environments that accommodate — and appeal to — people of all ages and abilities, without penalty to any group.

Our Mission

Our mission is to improve the quality of life for people of all ages and abilities by advocating and advancing the practice of transgenerational design: making products and environments compatible with those physical and sensory impairments associated with human aging and which limit major life activities.

We accomplish our mission through research, education, consultation, and publications – providing specialized information, training programs, design consultations, and product and environmental evaluations for corporations, businesses, public and private organizations, and academic programs.

Our Belief

We believe that products and environments should be designed at the outset to accommodate a "transgenerational" population, which includes people of all ages and abilities – the young, the old, the able, the disabled – without distinction and without penalty to any group.

Such "transgenerational" designs also accommodate those temporary disabilities that each of us acquires from falls, sprains, burns, broken bones, and diminished hearing and eyesight. They also benefit short people, pregnant women, children — even wounded war veterans — by helping everyone accomplish their activities of daily living more easily.

Founding Director

James Joseph Pirkl FIDSA, founding director, is professor emeritus of industrial design, a Fellow of the Industrial Designers Society of America (IDSA), and former senior research fellow at Syracuse University's All-University Gerontology Center. Described as a "key figure in universal design" by the Smithsonian's Cooper-Hewitt Design Museum, he is an occasional guest on National Public Radio and quoted in such publications as the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, USA Today, Metropolis, Dwell, Machine Design, Mechanical Engineering, and ID Magazine.