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A work of design inviting us to consider new ways of working: the IxDA Future Voice Award and its first recipient

Guest Post By Marc Rettig, 2013 Interaction Awards Jury Chair.

A new award: why?

The IxDA Interaction Awards take a view that’s pretty close to the trenches: people enter recent work, the jury choose winners worthy of recognition, and the result presents a snapshot of the current landscape of interaction design.

But we are moving across that landscape. You can see ways in which this year is different from the last year, and at the Interaction 13 conference there was lots of talk about trends that are going to change what we see in the Awards next year.

The Future Voice award steps back from the landscape of current work, and asks different questions. Instead of asking, “What exemplifies good interaction design this year and where is it going?," it asks: “Where could we choose to go?” The Future Voice award is a way for us to recognize work that inspires us to lift our heads from the work immediately in front of us, and consider the view from a higher altitude, a further depth, and a more distant horizon all at once.

Choosing the recipient of the Future Voice Award.

The Future Voice Award is chosen by each year’s jury chair, in consultation with the rest of the jury and the Awards committee. It is selected not only from entries, but from anything in the world whether entered or not, as representative of the following statement:

This work deeply embodies the spirit of the interaction award categories – optimizing, engaging, empowering, expressing, connecting, disrupting. And it does something more: The Future Voice Award recognizes work that demonstrates the profound potential of Interaction Design, which at its heart deals with the dynamics and depth of human relationship and conversation. Recognizing its recipient celebrates evidence of what Interaction Design could choose to become.

The recipient of the 2013 Future Voice Award: Studio H Bertie County

I’ll let the video make the introduction:


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Announcing the Winners of the 2013 Interaction Awards

We’re honored to announce this year’s top winners for the second-annual Interaction Awards!

Tonight, from the GE sponsored Awards ceremony and party at Interaction|13 in Toronto, Canada, 21 Balançoires, Daily tous les jours was awarded Best in Show, UX for Good: New Orleans, UX FOR GOOD was awarded People’s Choice, 100 BPM, by Maxime Dubreucq, Doris Feurstein, Shivanjali Tomar, Natalie Vanns and Umeå Institute of Design took home both Best Student and Best Concept.

“Interaction design was born in technology and business, but is growing up and leaving the nest. I can’t think of a more poetic example than our Best in Show winner, 21 Balançoires. It embodies the science of cooperation,” said Marc Rettig, 2013 Interaction Awards Jury Chair. “The design uses familiar play as an invitation to something surprising, something larger. That’s a glimpse of what can come from the interaction design point of view, which focuses on what happens between people, things, and places.”

A very special new award was also presented tonight, the Future Voice Award, selected by the jury chair and awarded in consultation with the entire jury. This year, Studio H: Bertie County by Project H was selected.

The Future Voice Award recognizes work demonstrating the profound potential of Interaction Design, which at its heart deals with the dynamics and depth of human relationship and conversation. The Studio H work tangibly demonstrates the spirit of the interaction award categories – optimizing, engaging, empowering, expressing, connecting, disrupting.

“Studio H demonstrates a way of designing with people rather than for them,” offered Rettig. “It represents a focus on a community’s abilities and relationships as explicit outcomes of design. In that way it is a ‘future voice’ for interaction design, and we’re celebrating that evidence of what Interaction Design could become.”

This evening, we celebrated a total of twenty five projects selected from hundreds of entries from 27 countries. These projects demonstrate exceptional design ranging from health-related products to interactive installations to new tools for civic participation.

“These winning projects clearly demonstrate the breadth, depth and impact of interaction design.” said Steve Baty, IxDA President. “They embody the material diversity of contemporary practice; the importance of both concept and craft; and the range of challenges being tackled by interaction designers. IxDA is thrilled to recognize these examples of excellence in interaction design.”

In selecting this year’s winners, our jurors engaged in long, thoughtful discussions, part of which are captured in the below video shorts:






We worked with filmmaker Christian Svanes Kolding and our sponsor Adobe TypeKit to create a collection of video shorts profiling all of our top winners. You can find them all here.

We want to thank everyone for participating this year, especially our kind sponsors Adobe TypeKit and GE. We look forward to seeing what’s in store for the 2014!


Full List of Awards:

Top prizes were awarded in the following categories: Best in Show, Best Concept, Best Student, People’s Choice, and Best in Category for six categories. An international jury selected the category award winners, and the People’s Choice Award was chosen by online voting, A full list of our winners can be found here.


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The 2013 Interaction Awards People’s Choice Award is now open for voting!

We're looking forward to celebrating the winners of the 2013 Interaction Awards, but there’s one award-winning project left to choose, and it's up to you! The Interaction Awards’ People’s Choice voting is now open at http://awards.ixda.org/vote. All 75 of the shortlisted projects are eligible for the Award.

Cast your vote and follow our announcement on January 29 to see how your vote compares to our jurors' selections. Last year's People's Choice winner, Interaction Cubes by Fundação Oswaldo Cruz/Museu da Vida, from Brazil, was also a top winner--taking home best in category, Engaging.

You can cast as many votes as you like, but you can only vote for each project once. Visit the gallery now, review the entries, and cast your votes today. Then spread the word and promote your favorite projects before voting closes on January 28 at 11:59pm EST.

The winner of the People’s Choice Award will be announced at the Interaction Awards celebration on Tuesday, January 29th, at Interaction 13 in Toronto. We hope to see you there!


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