Characteristics of the World's Design Awards - Case Study of the iF Design Award
SYRINX has won 25 design awards worldwide.
We would like to share with you some of the characteristics of design awards that we have gained from our experience in challenging for many awards.
There are two main types of design awards
Product-related design awards can be divided into two main categories.
Those with and without actual product judging.
In the case where there is no jurying of actual products, only text, images, and videos are used for judging.
In order to conduct actual product judging, the judging team needs to prepare a large hall, coordinate the judges' schedules, and receive, return, and display the products. However, there are many things that cannot be conveyed without touching the actual piece, such as the feel of the material, texture, scale, weight, and manufacturing precision.
As a general trend, the more prestigious the design award, the more difficult it is to win.
Examples of awards with actual product judging
- iF design award (Germany, one of the world's top three design awards)
- Red Dot Design Award (Germany, one of the world's top three design awards)
- IDEA Award (U.S.A., one of the world's top three awards)
- Garman Design Award (Germany)
- DFA Award (Hong Kong)
- Good Design Award (Japan)
- Omotenashi Selection (Japan)
Transparency of Judging
Even for design awards with actual judging, how the judging is conducted is, in most cases, a black box.
Since only a limited number of people conduct the judging, the results are largely dependent on the affinity (subjectivity) of the judges.
In fact, once an award is unsuccessful, it tends to be impossible to win it even if you try with a different product the following year, unless the lineup of judges changes.
However, the "iF Design Award" is the most reliable and special of them all.
A scorecard summarizing each jury member's individual scoring table from the first round, final scores, and award criteria points is provided, allowing you to trust the judging process and objectivity of the judges.
The image below shows the scorecard for Hitoe Fold Aria's winning entry. Although the award is primarily for industrial products and is strictly for handmade products, you can see that the product was evaluated quite highly in all evaluation categories and exceeded the acceptance criteria by 115 points. In the first round of judging, we also learn that there is quite a difference in the evaluation depending on the judges.
The more socially recognized an award is, the more transparent it should be, but most awards are black boxes, and even when they are not selected, it is impossible to guess the reason. In this respect, I think iF design's approach is excellent.
Other awards that are unique to the judging process are the Omotenashi Selection, where you can get a list of comments from the selectors and learn what they think of the live selection process.
