Wednesday, 2 November 2005 | Levent OZLER

Wastebasket Wins Good Design Award 2005 in Japan

With its newly developed wastebasket, 'Bin Bin', the Danish design company Essey has won the “Good design Award” 2005 in Japan.

On October 3rd the Japan Industrial Design Promotion Organization (JIDPO), announced the recipients of the Good Design Awards (G-Mark) for 2005, the 49th year of the awards.

The Good Design Awards, Japan's only comprehensive system for evaluating and recognizing design, originate in the Good Design Selection System established by the Ministry of International Trade and Industry in 1957. This year over 3000 products and designs participated in the competition.

Bin Bin received the Good Design Award in the category, Product Design/Everyday goods and gardening products.

The product has a unique identity looking exactly like the contents it is designed to contain; crushed paper. Bin Bin is made of rigid high density polyethylene and comes in two colours – white and black. In many respects the product goes back-to-the basic idea of minimalist and communicative design. Comments such as “How else should a paper bin look like?” make a significant statement of product identity. Bin Bin is designed by John Brauer for Essey.

The design process itself consisted of creating small miniature models from paper that was first crushed and then unfolded again. After working with over 500 mini models the final model was eventually selected and a digital 3D image made. The image was then scaled and modified for manufacturing. Bin Bin is produced in Sweden.

Essey is a new design company with a range of products stretching from Scandinavian simplicity to metaphoric designs expressions. All products are available worldwide through a network of distributors.

Bin Bin carries the "G-mark" the accepted symbol for "high-quality," "great usability," and "well-balanced" products. Only products with the G-mark can receive the award and it carries a widely recognised high social value. Tokyo based Blaudesign Inc. who represent Essey products in Japan, submitted Bin Bin for consideration and will participate in the Award ceremony later this month.