The Hungarian Design Award, which is open to designers, manufacturers, retailers, distributors and clients with innovative creations, was presented for the 44th time this year. As in previous years, awards were given in the categories of product, design, visual communication and student. The Hungarian Intellectual Property Office (SZTNH), the State Secretariat for Culture and Higher Education of the Ministry of Culture and Innovation (KIM), the Hungarian Design Council and, for the first time this year, Árkossy Bútor Kft. offered a special mentoring prize in the competition.
The Hungarian Design Award in the product category was won by BOO Studio , created by Eszter Lebó and Ildikó Kele, who make knitted clothes for children and adults from Merino wool. Also awarded in this category was the Repeta collection, a collaboration between Sára Kele and Anna Cserba, based on the reuse of materials classified as waste, such as construction debris or even walnut shells. The special prize of the SZTNH was awarded to RatiNook’s car trunk stabilisers. The products were conceived by Ferenc Laufer and András Húnfalvi, founders of the Flying Objects design studio.
The design category of the Hungarian Design Award was won by FOGAS VISION 360°, the work of Ádám Molnár, who developed a new rack railway vehicle concept for the capital. In this category, a special prize was awarded to the joint work of Dr. Judit Schultheisz , the owner of the idea, and the team of the collaborating Co&Co Designcommunication – Gergely Hosszú, Tamás Cosovan, Richárd Nagy, Márton Budai and Balázs Buhala – for the HUPLE , a medical device and method ofmovement therapy, which is primarily suitable for the diagnosis, treatment and development of premature babies, children with neurodevelopmental disorders or children with different developmental pathways.
In the category of visual communication, the Hungarian Design Award was given to the new image of the Ethnographic Museum, which was also the work of a team of designers, Hunor Kátay, Sebestyén Németh, Szilárd Kovács, Enikő Déri and Nóra Demeczky, who spent several months in intensive workshops with the staff of the institution during a unique design process. The image, which effectively represents the vast cultural treasury held by the museum, identifies the institution on its own, without textual designation, and its graphic elements effectively and clearly refer to the dialogue between cultures and generations and to the symbiosis with the present.
The Ministry of Culture and Innovation’s special prize was awarded to Komp, an experimental study booklet by 21st Laboratory, designed by Dóra Balla.
Blanka Timár, a student of Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design, won the Hungarian Design Award in the student category with her A\O Lamp Family. The other winner of the category was Zsófia Papp’s project In Flower Language – Folk Art as a Transgenerational Heritage.
The special prize of KIM State Secretariat for Higher Education was shared between Liza Feil, a student of Budapest Metropolitan University, for her smart buoy monitoring water quality called NIMUE and Balázs Rovó, a student of Széchenyi István University, for his PUPIL eye examination device.
Nóra Szilágyi, Róbert Kristóffy and Máté Guthy, students of the Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design, won the special mentoring prize of Árkossy Bútor Kft. with their home training bench called “At least”
Established in 2009, the Design Management Award, presented by the Hungarian Design Council for the 15th time, is awarded every year to a company that effectively incorporates design management into its operating model. Previous recipients of the award include such well-known and outstanding organisations as Radnóti Theatre, Hamerli/1861 Glove Manufactory Pécs, Cserpes Cheese Workshop, Julius-K9 and Panyolium. The 2023 winner is 77 Elektronika Kft., a developer, manufacturer and distributor of world-class medical devices.
At the Design Management Award, the special prize of the National Intellectual Property Office was awarded to Minusplus General Design Ltd. as an architectural design and design office applying innovative and sustainable solutions, and to Image Service Ltd., a manufacturer of halQ acoustic panels. The special prize of the Herendi Porcelain Manufactory went to Vitéz Kürtős - Földijó Gasztro Kft. The company and the product are proof that the design approach works at all levels, sizes and segments.
A certificate of appreciation was awarded to the Hosszúlépés.Járunk? - Városi séta Kft., a company which uses design management tools to make their business stand out from the competition and their services user-centred.
Among the highlights of Budapest Design Week are the See into the Future (10 October, 16:00), a series of lectures on the distant future and the role of designers in it, and the We Are in the Future (11 October, 16:00), a series of lectures and a roundtable discussion where designers and companies will present how the role of design and designers will evolve in the future. The festival will dedicate Thursday to the future of creative businesses: from noon, the FutureLIFE programme will present the grants, mentoring programmes and other opportunities available for the creative industries, while from 3 p.m., the FuturePROSPECT will focus on skills development, in the context of the European Year of Skills 2023, announced by the European Union. The Entrepreneurship Development Day will close with the 5th anniversary of the Start up Guide LIVE, entitled Designpályán20, where a number of successful Hungarian design companies will share their experiences of the past twenty years.
In addition to the Budapest Design Week’s own events, the festival’s partners will enrich the programme with more than 120 varied events in the capital and in partner cities. This year, Szeged joined as a new participant to Pécs and Szombathely.
For a list of programmes and venues in the capital and the countryside, see the Budapest Design Map and the website. The exhibition, which presents the entries recognised by the Hungarian Design Award and Design Management Award, can be visited between 6 and 15 October during the opening hours of the Museum of Ethnography. And the achievements and memories of the festival’s 20-year history will be brought to life in a special installation at the BDW20’s central venue.
More details: https://budapestdesignweek.hu/