Inclusive Design is Human Design
We are broadening the reach of accessible design and setting best practices with partners like, the Sasaki Foundation, the Mosesian Center for the Arts, the Perkins School for the Blind, and the City of Boston.
Diversity, equity, and inclusion
“Contribution is the only value…for it brings the advantage of giving more than one person’s slant to a problem, and shows how differences may be harmonized by active discussion.”
Hideo Sasaki, Founder, 1957
Our founder, Hideo Sasaki, was an early champion of bringing diverse design perspectives together to strengthen ideas and outcomes, an approach that set us apart at the time of our founding. Sasaki intentionally invited multiple thinkers to the table and that table has only expanded over the years to bring more people around it.
Our contemporary understanding of diversity has built upon this foundation, extending beyond bringing collaborators from different disciplines together to a broader recognition of the value that an individual’s personal identity and perspective adds to design. We are therefore committed to advancing diversity, equity, and inclusion both in the design of our projects and of our firm culture and operations.
Designing Places that Welcome All
Our mix of diverse vantage points is essential to Sasaki’s ability to connect with clients and communities around the world. We work to ensure that a variety of constituents are active participants in the design process. Our design teams listen, engage, and reflect the distinct priorities of the communities, institutions, governments, and private companies with whom we work.
Frederick Douglass Memorial Project Solicits Community Input
The Nubian Square (formerly, Dudley Square) community convenes to discuss public space and how to create a Frederick Douglass memorial that's welcoming to all, but acts as a safe space for Boston's black community. The session included a moving spoken word performance of "Radical Black Girl" by local artist Des Polk.
Wilmington Waterfront Promenade
Along with the 30-acre Wilmington Waterfront Park completed in 2011, the 9-acre Promenade will continue a transformation of an industrial waterfront into a public space serving a predominantly Hispanic community that actively participated in shaping the future of these spaces.
Boston City Hall Plaza Renovation
The renovation of Boston's City Hall Plaza will address the steep grade changes that have made the plaza inaccessible for over 50 years. The new design prioritizes universal accessibility in the consideration of pathways, grading, and materiality.
Kabul Urban Design Framework
At the urging of Afghan President Ashraf Ghani the Sasaki design team conducted deep research and designed toolkits to guide the creation of urban spaces for women, focused on parks and open space, urban amenities, and mobility. Creating spaces and implementing strategies explicitly for women’s needs is an essential step towards gender equality in the city.
Sasaki & LAF Co-Host Equity and Inclusion Panel
“In the same way that we take responsibility for ecological and sustainable approaches to design, we have to do the same with these issues of equity and inclusion,” says Sasaki designer Diana Fernandez, who moderated the all-female panel on diversifying the design profession.
Barr Foundation Supports Sasaki Foundation in Promoting Equity in Design
“Design has the power to address the most urgent societal, structural, and physical challenges we face today, from social equity to mobility to environmental resilience. It is an agent of change. And yet, access to design—for communities that need it the most—is often limited,” says Alexandra Lee, Executive Director of Sasaki Foundation. The Barr Foundation's grant enables greater community impact.
Leveling the Playing Field Within Sports Architecture
"There are few women — and even fewer people of color — who design athletics and recreation facilities...the end-users and communities for whom we design these facilities, however, tend to be much more diverse — both in terms of race and gender." So how can the industry do better? Sasaki architectural designer Emily Parris puts forth concrete, actionable steps designers can take to make sports architecture more inclusive in Athletic Business magazine.
Sasaki Culture
We cultivate our ability to hear and to articulate diverse perspectives within our studio through intentional policies and practices. We are committed to recruiting and growing diverse talent at every level of the firm, making space for different styles of leadership, and cultivating an environment that celebrates difference as a core strength.
Below are some of the ways we educate one another about different cultures; advocate for marginalized groups; expose youth to the design field; invite voices into conversation through the Sasaki Foundation; and more:
Sasaki Celebrates Pride 2019
Sasaki aspires to galvanize the entire Boston design community in advocating on behalf of LGBTQ+ communities. This year's Pride awareness week included educational film screenings, a fundraising campaign, gallery showing, and a colorful and joyful march.
Sasaki Celebrates Moon Festival 2019
The August Moon Festival is celebrated by cultures across Asia. This celebration, chock full of food, music, and educational moments, was one of 2019's High Holidays, a program that encourages cultural exchange across our diverse office.
Sasaki’s Diversity Statement
Sasaki is a culturally diverse design firm that powers its mission in the world through the collective work of our employees. We offer opportunity and reward achievement regardless of an individual’s gender identity, sexual orientation, race, age, religion, ethnicity, country of origin, social class, or disability. We give people with different backgrounds, skills, and perspectives a voice at the table to enable design outcomes that best address the complex needs of the clients and communities we serve.
Sasaki is a “Just” Organization
As part of our ongoing efforts to advance industry-wide standards for more responsible and equitable business practices, Sasaki regularly updates its Just 2.0 label issued by the International Living Future Institute (ILFI), a nonprofit working to build an ecologically-minded, restorative world for all people.
Just is a transparency platform for companies and institutions to publicly disclose their performance and policies surrounding specific categories like diversity and inclusion, employee benefits, and purchasing & supply chain.
Each organization is given a “nutrition label” based on their submitted data and policies, ranking their performance from 1 to 4, with 4 indicating the firm’s adherence to ILFI’s best practice in that category.
Working closely with representatives from ILFI to gather data and evaluate policies, Sasaki received our first label in 2020, and recently received a new label in 2022. The process of renewing the label is valuable, as it gives us an opportunity to take stock of our policies and practices, formalize new ones where lacking, and identify room for short- and long-term improvement.
Just label version 2.0, acquired in April 2022