The London Design Museum has announced that the redesigned UK government website GOV.UK has won the Design of the Year Award 2013. The site was chosen as the overall winner of the annual awards from the seven category winners that were announced last week. The new UK government website has been rationalized from a number of websites into a one-stop shop with a new typeface and a refined, highly accessible user experience.
Looking at other eye-catching category winners, the London Design Museum's overall choice may at first seem out of place, given its ultra-simple design and apparently dry content, that includes guidance on passport applications and tax information. The judging panel, composed of critics, academics, designers, and museum curators, assessed nominees on a wide range of criteria, and, following its success in the digital design category, the GOV.UK website was considered in terms of the user interaction as well as aesthetics. “For the first time, people can find out what's happening inside government, all in one place, and in a clear and consistent format,” UK Prime Minister David Cameron said.
Here's a brief rundown of the category winners:
Transport
The Morph folding wheel by Vitamins Design, which folds up into approximately half of its unfolded volume, took out the top prize in the transport category.
Furniture
The award winner in the furniture category is a beautifully formed wooden chair by industrial designer Konstantin Grcic dubbed the Medici Chair, designed for Italian brand Mattiazzi.
Fashion
Despite numerous fashion house collections being among the nominees, the top spot in the fashion category was awarded to a documentary on the influential fashion columnist and editor Diana Vreeland called The Eye has to Travel. It was filmed by director Lisa Immordino Vreeland,
Architecture
A refurbished 1960' tower block called Tour Bois-le-Prêtre in Northern Paris, designed by Frédéric Druot, Anne Lacaton and Jean-Philippe Vassal, scooped the architecture prize. It was recognized for its elegant and space-enhancing, yet cost-effective approach to the modernization of an aging and neglected building.
Product
The design museum awarded the best product prize to The Kit Yamoyo medicine container for developing countries by ColaLife and PI Global. The kit, cleverly designed to fit between bottles of Coca-Cola when packed for transportation, is to be distributed across Zambia to help treat diarrhea, which ColaLife states is the second biggest killer of children in the developing world.
Graphics
Finally, the graphics category award winner was the brand identity of the Venice Architecture Biennale for which designer John Morgan literally stenciled signs and directions onto Venetian building fronts to enable people to navigate or get lost in the best way amongst the canals.The London Design Museum awards have been running for six years. There are no cash prizes given, and instead the aim, as the museum puts it, is to “showcase the most innovative and imaginative designs from around the world, over the past year, spanning seven categories.” The Designs of the Year Exhibition is running between March 20 and July 07 London Design Museum.
Source: The London Design Museum