The Red Dot Design Award is, without a doubt, the most prestigious design award in the world today. The Design Zentrum Nordrhein Westfalen, a German organization, bestows this honor. The Red Dot Design Award has been given to recipients from all over the world since 1954.
When the Haus Industrieform in Germany was founded in 1954, the Red Dot Design Award was born. Their mission was to “facilitate an appropriate design of the environment for the general public.” It had a broad and difficult mission. Rather than simply making a profit, the goal was to improve the world’s environment, aid Germany’s export market recovery, and promote simple and clear design aesthetics. In fact, it was founded as a protest against “the uglification of the world.”
The designs shown as part of the Red Dot Design Award attracted hundreds of thousands of visitors only two years after its inception. It went through a period of transition in the late 1960s, as the world reacted negatively to what was perceived as glorifying consumption. The Red Dot Design Award responded, adapting to the mood of the time.
The prestige of the Red Dot Design Award grew as the importance of design became more apparent in the modern world. It evolved into an international award, and in 2005, it established a design center in Singapore, assisting in its globalization. The Red Dot Design Award: Design Concept award winners are displayed in Singapore’s design museum.
The larger Red Dot Design Award is made up of three awards. The Product Design Award, the first of these, is probably the most well-known. It allows competitors in a variety of manufacturing design fields, such as car, furniture, and appliance design, to compete. A Design Team award is included in the Red Dot Design Award: Product Design, which seeks to recognize truly exceptional design teams. BMW and Apple Computers’ design teams have both won in the past.
The Red Dot Design Award: Communication Design, which was founded in 1993, is a more recent design award. Non-manufacturing fields of design, such as advertising, sound design, and corporate design, are recognized with the communication award. Despite the fact that most of these fields have other prestigious awards, the Red Dot name lends credibility to this award.
The Design Concept Award is the most recent of the Red Dot Design Awards. This award is given for entire conceptual designs rather than individual products or product lines. This award was first given out in 2005, so it hasn’t had much time to establish itself in the world. However, because there are few larger conceptual awards, it is already a sought-after prize.
The Red Dot Design Award competition attracted a small number of applicants at first, and this low number remained throughout the 1970s and 1980s. The numbers began to rise in the 1990s, and they have risen dramatically in recent years. In 2007, over 3800 people applied for the Communication Design award, with 336 people winning, and over 2500 people applied for the Product Design award, with 623 people winning.