Giovanna Castiglioni - “I’d like to see new ideas in objects that focus on people's needs, consider capacity and functionality, but also manage to strike a balance between plainness and irony.”
Giovanna, daughter of the renowned Italian designer and curator of the Achille Castiglioni Studio Museum, is also Vice President and Secretary General of the Achille Castiglioni Foundation.
Ph. Annette Cheung
What are you looking forward to finding in our entries and which features are you going to reward?
I’d like to see new ideas in objects that focus on people's needs, consider capacity and functionality, but also manage to strike a balance between plainness and irony.
Which role do you think a Design Award should have nowadays?
A Design Award should be exemplary for a way of designing. It should present and propagate a variety of intelligent projects that inspire the younger generation to emulate this formula and be creative themselves. It should also underline the important role of designers and how involving them into a project can actually help to address real-life necessities.
In which direction should contemporary product Design go and how should it evolve to answer people’s needs?
The ingredients for good design: a lot of research, curiosity and interest in people and what drives them, modesty and constant exchange with other disciplines to enhance knowledge.
Austin Maynard Architects - 'We are looking forward to seeing [...] submissions that have sustainability, innovation and ingenuity at their core.”
Andrew Maynard and Mark Austin, founders of Australian studio Austin Maynard Architects, embrace participatory design by focusing on life-enhancing qualities, culture, heritage, community interest, sustainable design and experimentation.
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Ph. Tess Kelly
What are you looking forward to finding in our entries and which features are you going to reward?
We are looking forward to seeing something beautiful and surprising among the entries -submissions that have sustainability, innovation and ingenuity at their core.
Which role do you think a Design Award should have nowadays?
We believe a design award should be viewed as industry recognition for high achievement. An award given by peers is of high value because the jury understands, from personal experience, the level of commitment, talent and hard work that goes into a completed work.
In which direction should contemporary product Design go and how should it evolve to answer people’s needs?
We believe contemporary product design should aim to represent the times in which they are made. In the current climate there are many issues that can be addressed, highlighted and made culturally relevant through design.
Yu Ting - “If we’re not exploring, we’re not doing anything. We are just waiting around.”
We also questioned Yu Ting, founder of avant-garde architecture firm Wutopia Lab, who employs Magical Realism to work ‘miracles’ in everyday life, based on glocalization.
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What are you looking forward to finding in our entries and which features are you going to reward?
I am interested in category of construction. Here I would like to see the true innovation.
Which role do you think a Design Award should have nowadays?
Nowadays many designs are talking about a humanistic concern that doesn't stand up to scrutiny. I am expecting a piercing exploration of habitual stereotypes. If we’re not exploring, we ‘re not doing anything. We are just waiting around.
In which direction should contemporary product Design go and how should it evolve to answer people’s needs?
We are still surrounded by an unnecessarily large number of things around us, which we get rid of again over time and buy new ones. But if, for example, you have a chair that you still like and is also extremely comfortable, you will not throw it away. I see meaning and future in this approach.
