Announcement
The Design Educates Awards recognize, showcase, and promote globally the best ideas and implementations of architecture and design that can educate. DEAwards reach beyond the regular architecture contest priorities, it searches for something that will have a lasting influence beyond the everpresent effects of design and architecture.
Each year, the esteemed panel of judges selects the outstanding ideas and implementations in the categories of architectural design, product design, universal design, and responsive design. The Jury of the edition 2021 has been joined by Prof. Alison Brooks, Prof. Farshid Moussavi, Prof. Jürgen Mayer H., Prof. Toyo Itō, David Basulto, Hani Rashid, Konstantin Grcic, Andrés Reisinger, Enrica Cavarzan, Dr. Peter Kuczia, Aidin Ardjomandi, Ir. Kristina Bacht, Issa Diabaté, Alain Gilles, Hella Jongerius, Hadi Teherani, Marco Zavagno.
In addition to the main prizes, the awards include “emerging designers” recognition (for the best student designs), and “Solarlux Choice” (the selection of the projects made by representatives of Solarlux – strategic partner of the awards).
All winning projects are available on the official website of the awards: www.designeducates.com
The laureates of the main prizes are:
- Winner for the year 2021 in architectural design: “Zheshui Natural Library” (by LUO studio)
- Winner for the year 2021 in product design + Emerging designers 2021: “GoRolloe” (by Kristen Tapping)
- Gold prize in universal design: “Braille meets emoticons – a visual language for visually impaired” (by Walda Verbaenen)
- Gold prize in responsive design: “Villa Ypsilon” (by LASSA and collaborators)
- Solarlux Choice 2021: (1)“Public Library, Dornbirn” (by Dietrich | Untertrifaller with Christian Schmoelz and collaborators); (2)”Prisma – Schorndorf Station” (by schneider+schumacher and collaborators)
Winner for the year 2021 in ARCHITECTURAL DESIGN: “Zheshui Natural Library” (by LUO studio)
Category: Architectural Design
Design team:
- Team Representative/Chief architect: Luo Yujie
- Design team: LUO studio
- Participating designers: Huang Shangwan
- Client: Zheshui Village Committee, Liuquan Township, Lingchuan County, Shanxi Province
- Construction firm: Old Wu XiaoWu and his workmates, Xiao Fang and his workmates, The villagers of Zheshui Village
- Photography: Jin Weiqi
Description
Zheshui Village is located in Taihang Mountains, Shanxi. The village and the topography are closely articulated. Many houses there are built by leaning on the mountain. Zheshui Natural library is inspired by this traditional construction method, and the building is attached on the rock.
The “bookshelf” provides three functions in this building: column-grid structure, place to seat and book containers. All foundations are light foundations with minimal natural damage to the land. For the sake of saving materials, the timber we used are very thin. The timber columns are 4 cm thick in section, the timber beams are 2.5 cm wide in section. Each structural component is connected to each other to form a stable structural system. The gap between the columns is filled with glass bricks, which is both an internal and external partition，at the same time support building units. The roof is assembled with two layers of panels, one layer is laid horizontally, and the other layer is laid longitudinally. All the components work together to form the structure system. They are structures, enclosed components, and windows.
Winner for the year 2021 in PRODUCT DESIGN + EMERGING DESIGNERS 2021: “GoRolloe” (by Kristen Tapping)
Category: Product Design (student)
Air pollution is one of the most important public health challenges of the 21st century as it continues to threaten the health and prosperity of populations across the globe. It is responsible for more than seven million deaths every year worldwide, of which 600,000 are children. Its global cost is $9 billion a day, or $4 trillion per year. Our product comes at a needed time in the market due to these social and environmental challenges.
GoRolloe is developing a bicycle wheel to filter outdoor air pollution including noxious gases and particulate matter. Using only the rider’s kinetic energy, the wheel draws polluted air into a set of filters and expels the cleaner air towards the rider’s face and into the environment. The average PM2.5 concentration in London is 13.3 μg/m3. Our 26″ wheel can filter 1.25 m3/km of air which, based on the usage of 11,500 Santander bikes in London, equates to 170,560m3 filtered per day, or 24 professional European football fields at a 1 meter height.
The filters can be cleaned and reused on a continuous basis creating a circular product lifecycle. Captured pollutants are donated to third party organisations to create new products such as construction material. The materials used to create the wheel will either be a reinforced recycled polymer that can in turn be recycled, or an innovative biocomposite that can withstand environmental stresses and the extreme wear and tear that comes with industrial usage.
The wheel can be adapted to any bike and is initially targeted at cycle-for-hire schemes followed later by the consumer market. The end users of the product are city commuters using bikes for their daily transits. Local authorities are interested in this solution as it improves air quality for their community, gets their citizens involved in sustainability, and promotes a green image of their city.
By integrating cycle-for-hire schemes, our product will be available throughout most city areas reaching people from all economic statuses. This innovation enables citizens to actively participate in creating cleaner air around them, increasing health and safety for themselves and the public.
The concept was initially developed by the founder as a student at London South Bank University (LSBU) and has since won an award, received international media coverage, and received interest from government bodies and private manufacturers and distributors.
The product is now undergoing development and testing to optimize function, promote ergonomic use, reduce manufacturing costs, and establish concrete data on pollution capture. We have in-kind support from LSBU allowing us to conduct prototyping and testing using their equipment and facilities. We have also been awarded an engineering grant by Sustainable Innovations providing us with experts in material research, filter testing, and CFD analysis. During final stages, the filters will be tested in a real environment and analysed by third party laboratories to externally validate the data.
GoRolloe aims to have test models ready to pilot launch by Fall 2021 and have commercial output by mid-2022.
Founder, CEO, team rep, and author: Kristen Tapping
Supported by:
- London South Bank University https://www.lsbu.ac.uk/
- London Business School Launchpad https://www.lbslaunchpad.com/
- Sustainable Innovations (https://www.sbi.business/si/home)
- The Worshipful Company of Horners (https://www.horners.org.uk/)
- Dassault Systems (https://www.solidworks.com/solution/organization-type/entrepreneurs-startups)
- Covestro https://www.covestro.com/en
The host of the ‘Design Educates Awards is Laka Foundation (a nonprofit and nongovernmental organization). The theme of the awards has been inspired by the research called Educating Buildings (Bildende Bauten) by Dr. Peter Kuczia. Contact the organizer at [email protected] The strategic partners of the awards are Solarlux GmbH and Architecture in the Foyer. Media sponsors are: Archdaily and v2com. Media partners are: World Architecture Community and Global Design Awards Lab.
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