Student creativity and craft was celebrated at the Dowse Art Museum last week for the ECC NZ Student Craft Design Awards, now in its 31st year. The Supreme Award went to Imogen Zino, an AUT Master of Design graduate, for her project The Materiality of Winter. The project is an interactive piece that hangs from the ceiling, made of thousands of handmade ceramic pieces. The result is “ a living space that engages with touch and responds both audibly and dynamically with it”, organisers say.

Judges said of the Supreme winner: “This is a delicate, fragile yet adorable interactive piece of work with a thoughtful sound experience. A magnificent installation that uses ceramics as a surface design and a very considered approach to the various levels of sound emitted. As Imogen states in her entry submission - it creates a space within a space. It is a surface, a structure and an environment to be inhabited.”

The project also won the Friends of the Dowse Surface Design Award: a new category that honoured work in textile design, pattern design, architectural surfaces, wall coverings and floor coverings.

The winners of the ECC NZ Student Craft Design Awards 2020 were decided by a judging panel made up of Karl Chitham, director of The Dowse Art Museum, Anita Dykes, lighting design consultant at ECC, Ian Douglas of The Village Goldsmith, Marilou Dadat, head designer of Kowtow, Richard Cutfield, director of Formway and Goodnature, Neke Moa, artist and designer, and Toby Morris, illustrator.

Other winners on the night included Victoria University industrial design student Andrew Roberts, taking home the ECC Furniture Design Award for his outdoor bench design, Te Wheke. Another Victoria University graduate, Courtney Naismith, took home the ECC Lighting Design Award for her series of 3D-printed baskets made of recycled soft plastic and flax waste called Lustrious Lights. 

Victoria University Master of Design student Matthew O’Hagan’s project The Scale Seat won the L’affare Innovation in Sustainability Award. The judges said of this furniture design, “In a world where sustainable solutions are increasingly needed, it is exciting to see the reforming of used materials, and in this case discarded fishing buoys, into usable objects. The surface texture and its black form would look good on any outdoor deck or lounge.”

See the full list of winners below and visit nzcraftdesignawards.com for more information:

Supreme Award Winner and Friends of the Dowse Surface Design Award – The Materiality of Winter by Imogen Zino

ECC Furniture Design Award – Te Wheke by Andrew Roberts

ECC Lighting Design Award – Lustrious Lights by Courtney Naismith

L’affare Innovation in Sustainability Award – Scale Seat by Matthew O’Hagan

ECC Product Design Award – Shape Shifter by Lucy Grunfled and Saskia Jamieson

Friends of The Dowse Visual Communication Illustration Design Award – Woven by Russell Hooton-Fox, Jack Whitehead, Case Dakota and Desmond Cheong

The Village Goldsmith Jewellery Design Award – Fairtrade? by Simon Smale

Tuatara Ceramics Award – This is Us by Eva Ding

Friends of The Dowse Fashion Design Award Winner – Te Kākahu ō Te Kaikaranga by Erana Kaa

ECC People’s Choice Award – Sacred Animals by Liam Nguyen (Quang Long Nguyen)