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| Design Plus Award For 36 Innovative Products Und Materials 36 products and materials distinguished by a combination of innovative materials, successful design and intelligent functionality have been chosen for the Design Plus Award on the occasion of Material Vision in Frankfurt am Main from 16 to 18 June 2009. The jury of experts made its selection from 160 exhibitors from 15 countries. The award winners come from Germany, Belgium, Denmark, France, Korea, Switzerland and the USA. This is the third time that Messe Frankfurt has held the competition on the occasion of Material Vision and, as in the past, the competition has been organised by the German Design Council (Rat für Formgebung). The awards will be presented during Material Vision in the lecture area in Hall 4.1 at 17.30 hrs on 17 June. All award-winning products will be on show there throughout the fair. Detlef Braun, Member of the Board of Management of Messe Frankfurt: "With Design Plus, we put the spotlight on products and materials that are future-oriented in terms of their functional, aesthetic and ecological qualities. This year, it was evident that the subject of sustainability played an important role for both the materials and products entered." Andrej Kupetz, Director of the German Design Council: "The Design Plus Material Vision competition draws the attention of a wider audience to innovations developed by industrial research departments, universities or start-up companies." An interdisciplinary jury of experts assessed the entries of the basis of the following criteria: design quality, material choice, utility value, technical quality, ecological quality / sustainability and overall concept. The members of the jury were: - Christof Struhk Managing Director, Modulor – Material Total, Berlin - Frederik Flötotto General Manager, Flötotto Systemmöbel GmbH, Rietberg - Frank Brammer Managing Director, FRANKEN\ ARCHITEKTEN GmbH, Frankfurt am Main - Tom Schönherr Partner, Phoenix Design, Stuttgart Among the award-winning materials was, for example, Nano-Stone (Richter Furniertechnik GmbH & Co. KG), a flexible stone veneer for everything from furniture design and product presentations to home and automobile-interior design. Nano-Stone is a genuine stone surface made of shale with a stone covering of only a few hundredths of a millimetre, which makes the stone surface and its reinforced backing so flexible. The jury was also impressed by another material, Spa-Styling (Resopal GmbH), a completely water-proof, ultra-light wall and floor element. The elements were developed for use in rooms liable to high moisture levels, e.g., health and wellness facilities, on the basis of a high-tech material from the automobile-manufacturing sector. Another Design Plus Award goes to the Polytol polyurethane-resin kit (Otto Bock Healthcare GmbH). Polytol is an innovative material for orthopaedic technology and is used for making flexible inside shafts for prostheses. The high-quality three-component resin is characterised by an enduring and very high level of elasticity. The Design Plus Award also goes to products made using innovative materials. For example, the Nuage Huitre pendent lamp by la font du ciel – luminaires, the uncompromisingly ecological concept of which left the jury in no doubt about its worth. The lamps are made of a vegetable parchment based completely on hemp fibres. The goal for the development of this material was that no synthetic and / or environmentally unfriendly materials should be used and that the manufacturing process should use as little energy as possible. Another winner of the Design Plus Award is EDAG GmbH & Co KGaA with a basalt-fibre bodywork concept for the automobile sector. Called Light Car – Open Source, the new material is primarily of a new kind of industrially standardised basalt fibre that can be fully recycled and is available in virtually unlimited quantities. The fibre is suitable for use in lightweight cars for tomorrow's mass market.The catalogue of the Design Plus Material Vision 2009 competition includes illustrations, product information and details of the manufacturers and designers. write your comments about the article :: © 2009 Exhibition News :: home page |