Change is the catalyst for the winners of Dutch Design Awards 2018

For the 24 winners of the Dutch Design Awards 2018, bringing about change is the most important motivator. None of the designers bow to the pressure of prevailing conventions, structures, systems or patterns (of thinking). Designers draw upon traditional design traits such as playfulness, or inventive narrative concepts as easily as their socially-engaged and disruptive view of the world according to the jury. This 16th edition of Dutch Design Awards presents several prizes per category. The work of all category winners will be shown during Dutch Design Week (20-28 October 2018), when the overall winner of the Future Award will also be announced.

Circularity, technology and trust 

This year, three themes stand out. Circularity is currently seen as the way to achieve (climate) goals and designers address these sustainability issues in radically different ways. The designers also speculate about the way technology is increasingly affecting our lives and, to a large extent, restore power to the source: the human being. And, in a time of fake news and Instagram, impact and trust are of the utmost importance. In response to this, many designers are developing an alternative image or new language. 

Insights

The rise of digital innovations presents encouraging opportunities for devising solutions to some of the most urgent issues facing today’s society. Such innovations and societal challenges call for cooperation between different disciplines and industries. Many of the current designers focus on researching and developing innovative and alternative work and production methods. The young generation of designers increasingly ventures beyond the boundaries of their own discipline(s) and continues to search for (new) forms of collaboration, with a variety of (also commercial) parties, and on the basis of other business models.

Winnaars DDA18 

This year’s winners of Dutch Design Awards are the following (in alphabetical order):

• AN EXPERIMENT WITH PARABOLAS | JOHANNES OFFERHAUS 
• CIRCA | ROBERT BRONWASSER DESIGN x CIRCA
• COMPULSORY SHENANIGANS' SHOW (S/S 2018) | SCHUELLER DE WAAL
• COW&CO | ANASTASIA EGGERS x OTTONIE VON ROEDER
• CUSTOM 3D WOVEN TEXTILE BLOKO | ALEKSANDRA GACA
• FAUXMOSAPIEN (THE EVOLUTION) | MAISON THE FAUX
• LISA KONNO | YOUNG DESIGNER
• LOWLANDS 2018 | HANSJE VAN HALEM STUDIO 
• MAGAZINE N° 5 – THE CABINET | MACGUFFIN MAGAZINE  
• MANON VAN HOECKEL | YOUNG DESIGNER
• MICRO HUIS SLIM FIT | ANA ROCHA ARCHITECTURE
• HET GROOTSTE MUSEUM VAN NEDERLAND | MUSEUM CATHARIJNECONVENT X FABRIQUE 
• MX3D BRIDGE | JORIS LAARMAN LAB x MX3D
• OLIVIER VAN HERPT | YOUNG DESIGNER
• PAPERSTORM.IT | MONIKER
• PEOPLE’S PAVILION | BUREAU SLA x OVERTREDERS W
• ROYAL DELFT: AUGMENTED BLUEWARE | ROYAL DELFT x FLEX/DESIGN x TWNKLS/AUGMENTED REALITY
• SOCIAL LABEL x VARIOUS DESIGNERS | SOCIAL LABEL
• SWAPFIETS | SWAPFIETS
• TRANSPARANTE LAADPAAL | THE INCREDIBLE MACHINE
• URGENTCITY - TOWARDS A NEW VOCABULARY OF TERMS | AMATEUR CITIES x NEW GENERATIONS
• VIIA - GRONINGEN AARDBEVINGSBESTENDIG | FRESHHEADS
• WAT NU, KOETSIER? | CHIVES ARCHIVES x RENÉ PUT
• ZALIGEBRUG | NEXT ARCHITECTS