Designs of the Year 2015: Our Top 5

Wednesday marked the opening of the 2015 Designs of the Year exhibition, gathering 76 nominees across six categories; architecture, digital, fashion, graphics, product and transport.

By design, the competition covers a diverse range of projects, though as in previous years there’s a particular focus on recognising endeavours that make our lives better.  That’s particularly apparent in this year’s shortlist.

Here’s a selection of mine and Carolina’s favourites.

Digital: Disclosed

Fresh from our recent sustainability thinkpiece, Disclosed’s slogan ‘shop the way you care’ caught our eye.

This ingenious app helps consumers make mindful grocery choices – whether it’s buying brands with minimal packaging, avoiding particular ingredients or shopping on principle.  Tap in your priorities and Disclosed rates each product, telling you how compatible you and it are.  Yep, it’s basically a dating app for food.

What’s so smart about this app is that it takes a complex and overwhelming decision-making process (System 2 choices for the behavioural economists out there) and simplifies it.  Genius.

Graphics: Inglorious Fruit & Vegetables

French supermarket chain Intermarché developed a fun and important campaign heroing fruit and vegetables in all their unusual – and traditionally, unsaleable – forms.

In an attempt to reduce the 300 million tonnes of fruit and vegetable waste each year, Intermarché gave The Grotesque Apple and The Hideous Orange pride of place in their stores, passing on a 30% saving for these colourful characters.

Product: Miito

Miito is a smart, energy saving alternative to the kettle, that we mentioned in our news bulletin back in November (ever ahead of the curve).

Most of us are guilty of overfilling the kettle, wasting huge amounts of energy.

With this neat alternative, a heated rod and induction base enables you to boil just the water you need – whether it’s in a cup, jug or saucepan.  As the container itself is used in the process, it means you can also heat your soup or warm that cold cup of coffee.

Product: Air-purifying Billboard

This is a billboard with a difference.

In a similar vein to Coca-Cola’s plant billboard, scientists at the University of Engineering and Technology in Peru have created a board that can purify 100,000 cubic metres of polluted city air each day.  That’s the same as 12,000 trees and the effects can be felt up to 5 blocks away.

Transport: D-air Street

Described as an ‘airbag for bikers’, D-air Street communicates wirelessly with a control box and sensors on the bike, inflating the jacket before a collision.

A great example of wearable tech making a real difference.

The Designs of the Year 2015 exhibition runs until 23 August 2015 at the Design Museum.