Red Dot Award for graduation project from Beckmans
"I'm still so happy and amazed that my degree project lives on several years after graduation," says Ella Westlund. I want to change the way we look at furniture for people with disabilities and this price is proof that it is needed. The fact that the competition is international means that more people and countries can get inclusive public environments, which is incredible.
The Be A Part Of sofa is designed with the idea of giving wheelchair-bound children a chance to participate on equal terms. In the middle of the sofa there is room for a wheelchair, which gives the child a chance to sit with and not next to it. It was included in furniture manufacturer NC Möbler's regular range a little more than a year after it was first shown at Beckman's graduation exhibition in May 2017.
The project has already received a lot of attention in the past; Last autumn, for example, Ella was invited to Dutch Design Week to talk about the project at Design Indaba and Antenna Talks.
About Red Dot Award
The Red Dot Award is an international competition that awards the best in design since 1955. In this year's edition, 5,500 products from 55 countries were registered for the competition, of which 80 have been awarded the Red Dot Award. This year's prizes will be presented at a gala on 8 July in Essen and this year's winners will also be announced on red-dot.org.