SEATTLE, WA, May 29, 2009
/24-7PressRelease/ -- The Northwest Chapter of the Industrial Designers Society of America (IDSA), part of a national organization promoting the advancement of product design, today announced the Northwest Design Invitational Awards, held March 2009 in Seattle, recognizing the blood, sweat and tears of excellent industrial design in the Western District of IDSA. The Northwest Design Invitational is a competition recognizing outstanding industrial design.
"NWDI'09 offers industrial designers and students throughout the northwest community an opportunity to come together, learn, connect and share the latest in proper utilization of innovation, usability, responsibility, and aesthetics for improved marketability," said Tucker Viemeister, Lab Chief of Rockwell Group, New York, NY. "Design is a powerful tool for making the world better - this is an opportunity to showcase progress."
Entries were evaluated under five criteria: design innovation, user and market benefits, ecological responsibility and appropriate aesthetics. Competition categories include consumer, business and medical products, furniture and lighting, business and public environments, equipment, packaging and graphics, product-based interface, concepts, transportation, student work, and "breaking the rules." "Breaking the rules" is an all new category created by this year's jurors to distinguish designs that defy paradigms. The invitational was open to all design professionals and students within IDSA's Western District.
A special jury of three industrial design experts — all original founders of Smart Design — awarded honors to 30 designs spread across 10 categories. Five universities and 20 design organizations were honored. Expert jurors judged all entries in the competitive categories and included Tucker Viemeister, Lab Chief of Rockwell Group, Tom Dair, President of Smart Design USA and John Lonczak, Director of Phi-d.
Viemeister added, "The winning designs from the invitational show industry how rapidly designers are evolving, and with entrepreneurial and increasingly advanced approaches to conceptual work."
The Gold-level winners of the NWDI'09 included, Bocci, Carbon Design Group, Modo, notNeutral, Teague, Whipsaw Inc., Ziba, Justin Lund, and the Kurio development team. A complete gallery of winners can be seen at http://www.designinvitational.com.
The NWDI began years ago as an event aimed at honoring the work of designers from the Northwest chapter of IDSA and has blossomed to encompass great design from all over the western half of North America. Winning work came from Seattle, Portland, Northern California (San Francisco, San Jose), Southern California (Los Angeles), Phoenix, AZ, British Columbia, and Alberta, Canada.
"This invitational has helped unite the design community and gave us an opportunity to celebrate our achievements," said Alex Diener, IDSA and creative director of Pensar.
Of the conceptual work that was recognized, the concepts went beyond just sketches or renderings. Some, like Kurio: A Tangible Interactive Museum Guide, were fully functional prototypes, employing sophisticated RFID tags coupled with custom-programmed Arduino boards.
Diener added, "We're beginning to see designers breach the world of programming- giving objects and interactive experiences richer meaning. This edition of the competition illustrated that transformative shift in designer's capabilities."
Proud sponsors of NWDI'09 include Seed IP (www.seedlaw.com), Pensar Development (www.pensardevelopment.com), SOMOS (www.somosdesign.com), Product Creation Studio (www.productcreationstudio.com), General Assembly (www.productg.com), Microsoft (www.microsoft.com), Carbon Design Group (www.carbondesign.com), Livewire Prototyping (www.livewireprototyping.com), and Imaginit Technologies (www.rand.com/imaginit/1/index.htm).
About IDSA Northwest
The Industrial Designers Society of America (IDSA) is the voice of the industrial design profession, advancing the quality and positive impact of design. For more information, visit http://www.idsa.org
For more information on the 12th Northwest Design Invitational, visit http://www.designinvitational.com and http://www.idsanw.org
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