Tag Archives: A’ Design Award

The IKEA-worthy multifunctional hourglass lamp is an inspiration for the furniture design industry

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One of the greatest perks of my job is researching + understanding the trends that define the Industrial Design world in subtle yet significant ways. If we go by the latest IKEA x SONOS collaboration, the trend in furniture design is to create furniture design that goes beyond being only a piece of furniture, but instead be a well-crafted solution. The difference in both is whether you look at the set of 4 legs and one plank and see it as a table alone or a table that transforms into a chaise lounge when you want to take a nap! This transformative property makes the Hourglass Multifunctional Shelf a worthy winner of the A’ Design Award!

The hourglass shelf takes inspiration from the passage of time, and the functionality of the shelf changes throughout the day. Starting as a coat rack in the early mornings that holds your outdoor wear, the product’s main functionality becomes that of a shelf – to keep your knick-knacks in place. Finally, as the sun goes down, the design works as a detachable lamp, giving light and completing its cycle across the day. “The hourglass is the symbol of time, and the charm of time affects the tide-ups and downs, years change. The change of different roles reminds people to follow the direction of time, perceive the years and harvest exquisite life.” The detachable element of the lamp brings sheer joy to me! As a person surrounded by screens throughout the day, the lamp’s shape and portability make it almost meditative, a chance to literally disconnect and take some time off.

“One plus one is more than two” is the guiding principle behind every thought put into this design. Sure, it provides us with multiple functionalities, but it also creates an emotional connection with the interacting user by sparking joy. With the world leaning towards sustainability, the disposable approach of designing products is now passe. Given the direction mass-manufacturing giants like IKEA are taking (see their latest disassembly guide), the Hourglass Multifunctional Shelf is the perfect furniture design to join the IKEA must-buys. Certainly, given the multitude of usability this shelf provides, it passes the Marie Kondo test of sparking joy, making it a must-have in every home!

The Hourglass Multifunctional Shelf is the winner of the Silver A’ Design Award.

Designer: Ziel Home Furnishing Technology Co., Ltd

These smart city furniture uses solar panels, creating WiFi hotspots + charging outlets for the urban environment!

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Industries across the globe are steadily moving toward a smart future. A handful of public schools in Hungary went so far as to host a competition called “Smart School,” which gave designers creative freedom to conceptualize smart public furniture for schoolyards and city centers. For Smart School, Hello Wood, an architecture and design studio, designed and created the Fluid Cube and City Snake, two pieces of smart public furniture currently located in Hungary’s schoolyards.

Designed for use by the public, both the Fluid Cube and the City Snake primarily function as city benches with the same technical attributes. The Fluid Cube is a 9 cubic meter cube structure that partially encloses two parallel benches with an overhead roof for shelter during bad weather. The City Snake, a 7.5-meter outdoor bench that curves and bends to provide unique sitting options to travelers looking for a bit of respite. While the two structures provide seating for the public, they also come equipped with solar panels that generate power for some of the structure’s more technical features. Raised parts of the City Snake accommodates traditional solar panels, while solar cells are overlaid on the Fluid Cube’s glass roof. The solar panels on both of the structures yield power to use the built-in USB charging outlets, the WiFi hotspots, as well as the benches’ lighting systems.

Based in the bustling city of Budapest, Hello Wood designs and builds site-specific, public installations almost entirely from wood. City centers are known for travelers, commuters, busy workdays, and long walks. With smart technology outfitting most modern appliances and furniture, public furniture is getting revamped with smart features. Since a charger and WiFi are almost always needed throughout the day, Hungary’s smart, public furniture has both.

Designer: Hello Wood

The Fluid Cube’s roof provides a sheltered space for city-goers caught in the rain.

Featuring two parallel benches, the Fluid Cube primarily functions as a meeting place for sitting.

The Fluid Cube was almost entirely constructed from sustainably harvested wood.

Solar panels line the Fluid Cube’s roof to provide power for WiFi and the bench’s charging outlets.

The City Snake appears as more of a traditional city bench, with raised edges and panels for reclined sitting.

The City Snake powers up its WiFi hotspot and charging outlets from its solar panel.

This cat tower adopts a minimal hardwood design and stripped-down aesthetics to fit with every room’s interior!

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For as long as they’ve been around, cat towers have been adorned with beige carpeting. Invented in 1968, the first “cat tree” had carpeted perches, boxes, and inclines where cats could look out and observe all the goings-on of their territory. Updating the cat tower to fit today’s interior design standards, designers with Ziel Home Furnishing, a brand enterprise in Zhengzhou, China, have created Watch Tower, a hardwood cat tree that gives the cat tower from the 1960s a modern-day makeover.

While beige carpeting was fashionable when the first cat tower was invented, it has since been swapped for more reserved, minimal designs that feature hardwood accents and stripped-down ornamentation. Watch Tower carries a pretty wide and hefty base, which maintains stability for the rest of the tower. The first tier from the base features a wooden deck shaped like a donut through which cats can climb and jump before heading over to the second tier. Just above the wooden donut deck, cats can saunter their way to the wooden platform that juts out to hover above the ground, where they can hang out and paw at Watch Tower’s ball-on-a-string. Following research done on other models of cat towers, the designers learned that cats enjoy the tower’s top ledge to rest and look out over their home and observe all of its goings-on.

Watch Tower carries just enough understated sophistication to fit into living rooms and play areas where hardwood flooring is the predominant design scheme. Then, its playful design provides just enough entertainment for cats to slowly work their way up the tower for the whole day through. In addition to its adaptive design and entertaining layout, Watch Tower is detachable for easy disassembly and assembly. When the cat deems they’ve had enough time perched away in their observatory, then the whole tower can come apart to be stored away out of sight.

Designer: Ziel Home FurnishingTechnology Co., Ltd.

Following the cat tower from its base to its topmost perch, Watch Tower was designed to offer play on the bottom and a restful sanctuary up top.

The topmost perch provides a cushioned seat for cats to rest in and the circular scratching pad offers a place for cats to strengthen their claws and paws.

Detachable throughout, once your cat is finished rest up top, the whole structure can be easily dismantled and stored away.

Made entirely out of hardwood, Watch Tower was built to fit into any living room, with a minimal, yet sophisticated design.

This award-winning speaker also acts as a phone-stand and pen-stand!

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The Waving Multifunctional Speaker is a perfect example of how form and function can help redefine a product’s design. The speaker isn’t just designed to act as an audio-playing device. It’s mindful of the objects and spaces associated with it. Given that wireless speakers are almost always used with smartphones, the Waving Multifunctional Speaker even doubles as a dock/stand for your mobile, allowing you to watch videos on it while the three mid-range audio drivers on the front pump sound out.

The Waving Multifunctional Speaker even comes with a distinct wave-texture on its top which serves as a nifty area to rest stationery. Aware of the fact that most speakers find themselves placed on workdesks, the Waving Multifunctional Speaker integrates clever and convenient solution, allowing you to rest your pens and pencils on it while you work. Pretty clever, eh?

The Waving Multifunctional Speaker is a winner of the A’ Design Award for the year 2020.

Designer: RuiWang Xiang

Drummer or guitarist? You can be both with Drumstring!

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Anyone who has played a musical instrument has thought about combining it with another one at least once to get a creative kick out of “what would that sound like? and what would that look like?” and Designer Mohamad Montazeri started with just that. He was inspired to create the Drumstring by merging a percussion and a string instrument to create a completely unique sound and experience. Also, this is exactly what Captain America would be playing if he was in a band…and the band can also be called Agents of the S.H.I.E.L.D, a name that is totally based on the instrument and nothing else!

The shape of the award-winning Drumstring is inspired by a shield-like sign in areas where sound waves are being broadcasted. Apart from the completely new sound, this musical instrument gives us a chance to learn something like never before, see how it fits into songs, how the appearance makes us feel, what is the best way to hold it – it is an experience we can formulate from scratch. Musically speaking, the scales for drums are in D3, A3, B♭3, C4, D4, E4, F4, A4 system, and the string note scales are in the E-A-D-G-B-E system.

The user uses both hands to interact with the Drumstring, it is light in weight (5 lbs/2.4 kg) and has a strap that can be fastened over the shoulders and waist. The ergonomic build of the instrument is produced with gas nitridation which is used to harden the steel and the set is made of two nylon and four steel strings. Montazeri wanted to create an instrument that sparks the beginning of a new behavior from the world while keeping it modern, pure and emotional in its aesthetics and purpose. The Drumstring has also been awarded the European Product Design Award 2019 (Bronze) and the A’ Design Award and Competition 2017-18 (Silver).

Designer: Mohamad Montazeri

Simply twist to convert this regular screwdriver into a 90° screwdriver

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Designed for portability, and to get into those tough-to-reach spots, the Right Angle Screwdriver is a neat multi-tool with interchangeable heads and the ability to maneuver itself into difficult spots thanks to its novel design that allows the screwdriver to bend 90°. The miter-joint not only lets you reach screws in recessed places, but the 90° bend even gives you the power to unscrew or screw with much more torque. The size of a pen, the Right Angle Screwdriver is an ideal piece of EDC for the tinkerer, and its multiple heads just extend the product’s versatility!

The Right Angle Screwdriver is a winner of the A’ Design Award for the year 2019.

Designers: Qian Xiaowei & Ye Xinmin

House.zip

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If you really look at architecture, it’s nothing but vertical walls between a floor plane and a ceiling plane. If those walls were collapsible, your entire house wouldn’t be more than a meter in thickness. The ShelterPack is a disaster relief home that fits a bedroom (with 4 beds), bathroom, fully equipped kitchen, and a dining space (with furniture) into a slab just about 80 centimeters in height. The entire apartment can be set up in just a few hours by elevating the ceiling, and putting the walls in place.

The ShelterPack is ideal for places struck by disaster. When compressed, each pack is small enough to be carried in a semi-automatic truck. In bulk! Imagine giving comfortable homes to a 100 refugees/victims with just two such trucks!

The ShelterPack was awarded the Golden award at the A’ Design Awards 2016.

Designer: Hakan Gürs (Designnobis)

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A’ Design Award & Competitions’ Year of Design Campaign

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If you are an aspiring, young or establishing-yourself kinda designer, then the next three days are very important for you. The A’ Design Award has opened doors to the Year of Design Campaign, which is an opportunity for designers to join the competition with discounted fees. The doors (or discount window of 60%) remains open for 3-days only. So this means from 27-30 December 2012. In other words it’s Santa’s way of giving you a bonus gift this year!

The reason why we resonate with A’ Design Award is that it offers a platform for designers that creates publicity, PR push and advertisement opportunities for award winners. The competition supports the global design culture by creating incentives for participants to come up with superior designs for a better future.

So once again here are the details for you:

Discounted Entry Nomination Ticket for Year of Design Campaign can be used by participants that fulfill one of the criteria below:

  • Designers, Engineers, Artists and Architects
  • Students in Design, Engineering, Arts and Architecture fields
  • Not valid for corporations or enterprises with more than 10 workers

How to Apply

To apply to this program, you can purchase “Year of Design – Discounted Entry Nomination Ticket“. After purchase, you can directly proceed to uploading your designs, and use the ticket code that will be sent to you for completing the nomination process.

Application Dates:

  • 27 – 30 December 2012.
  • A Countdown Timer has been uploaded for your convenience.

During this short-time period, nomination tickets for the A’ Design Award and Competition are offered to eligible prospective participants at a 60% Discount: entries will cost 175 Euro instead of 375 Euro which is the late entry period fee.

Nominations Deadline: 28th of February, 2013.

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Yanko Design
Timeless Designs - Explore wonderful concepts from around the world!
Yanko Design Store - We are about more than just concepts. See what's hot at the YD Store!
(A’ Design Award & Competitions’ Year of Design Campaign was originally posted on Yanko Design)

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Last Week To Join A’ Design Award!

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Someone has rightly said that if you want to push your boundaries in creativity and innovation then simply thinking outside the box will not do. You have to test it on a global scale and then consider its relevance through the eyes of the world. Maybe this is why many believe that the perfect platform to test one’s metal is at the A’ Design Award. This is the last week that you can send in designs which are in concept stage, prototype or finished products. So hurry, because we know you want to strike gold!

The A’ Design Award have one of the most unique features that all designers love! They offer a system for designers to sell their winning ideas to sponsor companies; likewise the companies can bid for the competing design ideas and make offers to buy the designs. Essentially you have the potential to get noticed by big names from the industry right from the word go! Moreover you get a head-start into the business world as well!

There are around 80 Categories that you can participate in! More information is available here. Just remember that this is the last week to join the awards, as entries close on 30th September.

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Yanko Design
Timeless Designs - Explore wonderful concepts from around the world!
Yanko Design Store - We are about more than just concepts. See what's hot at the YD Store!
(Last Week To Join A’ Design Award! was originally posted on Yanko Design)

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