Last year, we were invited to join the Golden Pin Design Award 2019 in Taipei, Taiwan. It is not everyday that we can connect with like-minded individuals, and participate in design-led activities outside the country, so it was a no-brainer to participate. The Golden Pin Design Award is a prestigious event in Taiwan established in 1981 that aims to propagate outstanding innovation in design.
The trip composed of two days of design exploration and dialogue — from insightful talks by experts in the fields of architecture, design, and art, to the 2019 Winners’ Exhibition in the Taiwan Design Musuem, and from intimate discussions with the Golden Pin Design Award winners and experts to a trip to the Spring Pool Glass Factory who manufactured the W Glass, the entry that won Best Design and Special Award for Circular Design.
Photos — Marvin Conanan
Huat Lim, Architect and Managing Director of zlgdesign
A “thorough intellectual and perspective exchange” is what I would describe the whole experience. The different views on design, life, and sustainability — which is the main topic of the Golden Pin Design Award 2019 — inspired us to contemplate on our own definition of the words and concepts. “We all need to be beautiful. And for one to be beautiful, it should be truthful. Beauty and truth go together.” shared by Architect and Managing Director of zlgdesign, Huat Lim, about his thoughts on building spaces and products. While what we can read online and in books entirely aligns with his thought, there’s still more work to be done until we see it completely expressed in our built world. The idea of truthfulness in design can be elusive because becoming truthful has a pre-requisite — that is, knowing the “truth” — which can be daunting. So rather than investing on understanding the “truth” in projects, some designers would just design and build with what’s commonly accepted and what’s only beautiful from the outside to cut a few corners.
To discuss further, award-winning designer Tony Chi of New York interior design firm, tonychi, shared his ideology of design. “Design should never be judged from its outer surface,” he explained. While the phrase seems thrown towards clients and consumers, the end goal is for designers to also understand and be forced, to some extent, to not accept beauty as to what the eyes only see. A graceful marriage of stimulating the senses and expressing the truth of design should be the standard. For example, a proper chair should be designed to accommodate the human function of sitting down. However, some might design a chair to look visually-appealing first, and then utilitarian second, which is contrary to Tony Chi’s sentiments, “Design should have a baseline which is human behavior.” In other words, “truth” in design should come from human needs and conditions.
Tony Chi, Founder of tonychi Studio
Luisa Bocchietto, Architect and Former President of World Design Organization
When asked about how accessibility plays a part in design, Italian architect and former president of World Design Organization Luisa Bocchietto shared, “Design for all means to think about everyone. The culture of the past is only pushing design for human needs — now it’s also looking at the needs of other beings such as animals, plants, etc.” An eye-opening remark that brings the idea of sustainability and design to a more holistic and inclusive context. Nowadays, because of the increasing need for sustainability and circular systems, — decreasing harmful waste and overall consumption — it is not just about how we can design better for humans, but also how designs will impact the world around us.
W Glass Photos — HMM Project
To complete the experience and further manifest the idea of sustainable and circular design, the people of Taiwan Design Museum and organizers of Golden Pin Design Award brought us to the Spring Pool Glass, which is the largest glass recycling company in Taiwan. They are a vital element to the Kiwico Corporation-designed, W Glass, because their craftsmen made the special cup from 100% recycled glass. Not only does the W Glass look and feel well-designed, the process and idea behind it was also thoughtful all throughout — from dyeing the recycled glass to its amber hue, to shaping its twelve-angle form which is inspired by the hours of the clock and influenced by the concept of the cycle of life. Moreover, they also shared to us their mission of safeguarding and developing the glassmaking craft. We were brought to their workspace for a demonstration of glassmaking — heating, blowing, shaping, and cooling. It’s an enlightening experience to see how they still produce glass products by hand.
And to end it all on a high note, the people of Spring Pool Glass revealed their latest product, the AH Lightweight Insulation Block, a ‘green’ building material that’s made up of recycled flat-panel display glass that comes from consumer electronics. While concrete and other alternative building materials are still stronger, the block’s advantages are as follows: extraordinary resistance to fire, environmental-friendly production process and source, it is sound insulating, vibration absorbing, and non-toxic.
With all these and more, we head back to Manila with a renewed sense of sustainability and design. A restored hope to what we, as humans, can do to create better for ourselves, and the world.
