Student Design Awards winners: Nature of work
Brief 7: How might we reimagine the way we work in the future to reflect local context, experiences, and knowledge?
Winner: Neighbourhood Patch
A design proposal connecting people working remotely in cities to access private gardens in their local neighbourhood.
Neighbourhood patch is a future work lifestyle platform and light that pairs remote knowledge workers with a local garden space to support gardening breaks within their work day. The focus on gardening reduces stress and improves work-life balance, whilst the paired lights provide a physical element of communication between each partner. This proposal aims to support remote work-life balance, nurture collaborative relationships and share native plants to support local ecosystem.
Commendations
Highly commended
Melissa Bratton, University of Northampton, England
Thirdspace: An innovative park workspace for hybrid/remote workers, solving inequalities in space for home offices.
Manuela De la Vega, University for the Creative Arts, England
Pause and Play: Pause and Play is a campaign proposal to encourage knowledge workers to take more mindful breaks at the same time that they support local businesses, improving their physical and mental health and creating a sense of community.
As they approach their centenary, the Student Design Awards have established themselves as not only the oldest but also the most influential design awards for young people in the world. Past winners are a Who’s Who of the world’s most influential designers. I have no doubt this year’s winners will follow this same path, bringing the vision and creativity sorely needed to tackle today’s most pressing societal challenges.
