Break out your party hats: Earlier today, the Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian Design Museum's director, Caroline Baumann, announced the 2016 winners of the institution's National Design Awards. The program, which launched in 2000 as an official project of the White House Millennium Council, celebrates excellence, innovation, and achievement across 11 categories including product design, landscape architecture, fashion design, and communication design.
The winners will be honored at a gala dinner at the Cooper Hewitt on Thursday, October 20. So, who clinched the awards? Take a look at all of the categories and winners below, plus notes from the nine-member jury of design leaders and educators.
Moshe Safdie, the architect, urban planner, educator, theorist, and author—perhaps best known for his Habitat 67 housing complex in Montreal—received the institution's Lifetime Achievement award.
The Director's Award went to New Orleans-based organization Make It Right.
Founded by Brad Pitt in 2007, Make It Right is a nonprofit organization that builds homes, buildings, and communities for people in need. All Make It Right projects are LEED Platinum certified and Cradle to Cradle-inspired to meet the highest standards of green building. Make It Right began as an effort to rebuild safe and sustainable homes in New Orleans’ Lower Ninth Ward after Hurricane Katrina.
Bruce Mau won the award for Design Mind.
Bruce Mau is a world-renowned visionary, innovator, author, and designer, now living in Evanston, Illinois. Twenty-five years in the business of design gave Mau the practical and holistic insights to establish his consulting firm Massive Change Network in 2010.
The Corporate & Institutional Achievement award was bestowed on the Center for Urban Pedagogy (CUP).
The Center for Urban Pedagogy (CUP) is a New York City-based nonprofit organization that uses the power of design and art to increase meaningful civic engagement, particularly among historically underrepresented communities.
The Architecture Design award went to Fayetteville, Arkansas-based Marlon Blackwell Architects.
Marlon Blackwell is one of the nation’s most respected regional modernist architects. His Fayetteville, Arkansas–based practice, Marlon Blackwell Architects, combines vernacular traditions with rigorous formalism to create architecture that responds to the physical and cultural eccentricities of a place.
Geoff McFetridge won the award for Communication Design.
Geoff McFetridge is a graphic designer and artist based in Los Angeles, California. Through his design studio, Champion Graphics, McFetridge has created works for international brands, Hollywood films, and local bike shops that have a uniquely human touch.
The award for Fashion Design went to New York-based concept store and designer Opening Ceremony, which was founded in 2002 by Carol Lim and Humberto Leon.
Tellart won the award for Interaction Design.
Tellart is an international design studio that creates interactive objects, immersive spaces, and digital experiences for brands, museums, and multinational companies. Founded in 2000 by Matt Cottam and Nick Scappaticci, Tellart is headquartered in Providence, Rhode Island and has offices in San Francisco, New York, and Amsterdam.
San Francisco's Studio O+A won the award for Interior Design.
Led by principals Primo Orpilla, Verda Alexander, and Perry Stephney, O+A built its reputation on understanding how the next generation of entrepreneurs is changing the work environment and how those changes are abetted by design.
The Landscape Architecture award went to Hargreaves Associates, which is led by George Hargreaves, Mary Margaret Jones, and Gavin McMillan.
Hargreaves Associates has been at the forefront of landscape architecture for over thirty years and is globally renowned for the transformation of neglected urban sites, waterfronts, and campuses into memorable places that have become icons for their cities.
And the award for Product Design went to Ammunition, a studio based in San Francisco, California and Brooklyn, New York that is led by partners Robert Brunner, Matt Rolandson, and Brett Wickens.
Ammunition is a studio dedicated to putting design talent at the center of imagining, creating, and operating new product and service ventures.