Stone Over Stone

The Well-Tech Award 2009 international competition for technological innovation, held for the eighth time this year, has been announced. Every year the international Well-Tech Award is presented to sixty products / technologies / projects that stand out for their technological innovation and values of sustainability, accessibility and quality of life. From cars to home appliances, from environmentally friendly materials to new forms of renewable energy, from toys to medical systems.The assessment criteria include reduction of consumption, application of renewable materials and energies, ease of use by the elderly and the disabled, safety, visibility and easy comprehension of components, appropriate use of productive technologies and materials, and the product’s qualitative, functional and communicative values. Every year the Well-Tech Observatory constantly monitors the world of production and research to record and census hundreds of products worldwide. Sixty innovations t...

The fifth edition of the competition for young Italian students of design organised by MINI in collaboration with IED, with the participation of ADI. Projects must be submitted by September 7. Entrants are asked to "simplify, rationalise and redesign all the objects and systems that are meant to improve our cities without harming the environment". The competition announcements says: "In order to address the issue of the environment we must improve what already exists and take away rather than add. Bruno Munari said that 'progress means simplifying things, not complicating them'." After last year’s theme, "Adding value to water", the concept from which entrants are to draw inspiration this year is "New air in town". The competition is intended for young creative artists, graphics artists, fine artists, architects and designers, Italian citizens or foreign citizens working in Italy aged 18 to 35 ; it includes two separate competiti...

Suppliers in the furnishings, interior design and architecture sectors have until August 21 to present their latest new designs this year. Since it was launched in 2007, the annual M Technology Award 2009 has been organised and managed by iF International Forum Design GmbH of Hanover . Awards will be presented to the most interesting new developments and solutions, products and designs for furniture and interior decoration sub-supplies in the world this year. Entries are welcome for all kinds of ZOW products - materials, chemical products, surfaces, interior decoration components, built-in systems and elements, hardware, semi-products and plans, as well as related services. The awards ceremony will be held in the fall during ZOW in Italy . The winners of the 2009 competition will be officially announced on October 21, the opening day of ZOW Verona . The official partner of this third edition of the competition is the Italian industrial design association ADI (Associazione pe...

  blue in architecture 09 Water, Climate Change and Architecture September 24_ 27 2009 Palazzo Badoer, Venice , Italy Iuav University in Venice - "Sustainable urban design strategies" department with the Faculty of Architecture and the Doctorate School are promoting the First “blue in architecture 09” International Symposium. blue in architecture 09 is an international convention on the theme of water intended to promote awareness of the importance of urban, economic and environmental technological sustainability in design with the aim of improving the quality of planning and design processes. The three-day blue in architecture 09 symposium scheduled for September 24 through 27 2009 will focus on five themes: _ topic one | Climate, water, energy and the city _ topic two | Climate change and emergency strategies _ topic three | Architecture in a world without water _ topic four | Liquid ethics _ topic five | Amphibious architecture I...

Design for a living world May 14 2009 – January 4 2010 Cooper-Hewitt Museum, New York The "Design for a living world" exhibition at New York’s Cooper-Hewitt Museum focuses designers’ attention on the choice of sustainable natural materials. Nature Conservancy , an organisation for the protection of land and water all over the world, asked 10 designers to create objects from natural resources to reveal the life cycle of the materials used. The result is an ecological collection whose origins are certified by the territorial surveillance of the Nature Conservancy, now on display at the Cooper-Hewitt Museum in New York in the exhibition "Design for a living world" . The designers present, and the places where they worked on their projects, are: Yves Behar/Costa Rica; Stephen Burks/Australia; Hella Jongerius/Mexico; Maya Lin/Maine; Christien Meindertsma/Idaho; Isaac Mizrahi/Alaska; Abbott Miller/Bolivia; Ted Muehling/Micronesia; Kate Spade/B...