The second edition of the EESC Design Eleven competition is ready to reward the best innovative and sustainable design project and packaging. Exhibition featuring winning prototypes will open on September 21, 2011.
Design students and designers in all 27 EU Member States and European designers living abroad, were asked to focus on an important issue: "Intergenerational solidarity in times of an ageing population," by creating innovative and pertinent solutions in terms of "ageless design," through a process of participative design (final users taking part in the design process) and/or co-design (cross-generation team-building - young and elder designers collaborations).
Winners
1st Prize - Keep Cool
Vincent Gerkens, Brussels, Belgium
Keep Cool is a symbol for re-innovation. It provides a vernacular solution reconnecting the past and the present and inviting to reflect the environmental, cultural and historical context in which it exists. It is sustainable and ageless in design and material.
"By proposing this project, we want to defend the message that everybody can participate in the protection of the environment by using natural conditions. The main aim is to reduce the use of the fridge, to find an alternative without replacing it. With this product we intend to adapt the use of electrical domestics and have lower energy consumption."
The terracotta pot is a familiar object, for younger and older. This archetypal form is known by everybody, it is not a temporary trend, it is timeless.
KeepCool is low tech, not dependent on a technology which will be obsolete in a few years. It is made of ecological and recyclable materials. This product won't grow old and be replaced in some months by another technology, a new process.
2nd Prize - ORTOgether
Francesco di Luzio, Giulia Bartolucci, Sonia Fornea, Rome, Italy
This product reflects a process and a sustainable way of living. ORTOgether goes beyond planting flowers as it means creating and arranging your own garden in a social context. It promotes sharing, learning and intergenerational dialogue in a family environment.
Elderly people are experienced in cultivation of the land even if most of them - with the advance of the old age - are not able to do it again. Nowadays, new generations need a healthier life than the past and they desire to live close to the nature.
Farming could be a funny game for kids. Old people experiences - combined with energy and the guys' desire to learn all about it - lay the foundations to find another healthier way of life. The vegetable garden/kitchen garden could become a comic relief in which you can spend some time with the whole family, even with the children.
The material used to create the container is jute, which is a natural fibre extracted by the Corchorus plant and in fact, it is denominated as Corcoro. It is 100 % biodegradable and for that reason, it is compatible with the demands of the European Commission.
3rd Prize - Darning Pear
Mari Korgesaar, Liina Tiidor, Tartu, Estonia
It has a clear and intergenerational message of re-using things. It is a stimulating gift promoting repairing instead of throwing away. In this way it stands for going back to traditions and old skills and relates all generations.
With the "Darning pear" people should be reminded to the old tradition of mending clothes, one component of economical lifestyle. Darning pear is meant for repairing socks, but it can be used for other similar purposes.
Made from woodwork leftover, natural materials. The value of this product is stable in time.