Taiwan Wins 10 iF Communication Design Awards in 2011

The jury of the iF Communication Design Awards 2011 bestowed 231 designs, including 10 from Taiwan, with the iF outstanding design label, with the top 30 honored with the iF gold award, none of which went to designers from Taiwan, according to the Taiwan branch of the Germany-based iF International Forum Design.

A total of 861 submits from 27 nations were received this year, which were categorized among digital media, product interfaces, print media, cross-media and corporate architecture and evaluated according to various criteria, including animation, atmosphere, interface and screen design, usability, innovation, creativity and design quality, target audience specific communication and content, typography, uniqueness, corporate design, choice of material and finish, customer relevance, architecture, spatial concept and environmental impact.

The following summarizes the prize-winners from Taiwan.

Project Name: Senses Around | Music CD album (227-69189)

Category: 03.5 Product communication

Designer: Aaron Nieh Workshop

Client / Manufacturer: HIM International Music Inc., Taiwan

Designed for the album "Senses Around" by the singer Yoga Lin and published by HIM Music Co., Ltd. Taiwan, the packaging evokes two different images—violent and serene—to show contrast between noisy environment and sensory perception. The designer achieves an innovative folding album cover with unusual size, with plastic to lighten mass, and the package able to be conveniently displayed on shelves in record stores or unfolded before listening it.

Project Name: Wild Aspirations | Book (227-69429)

Category: 03.6 Publishing

Designer: Pao-Chin Huang, Ushow Design

Client / Manufacturer: Chou Ching-Hui Studio, Taiwan

The book's design revolves around photography of children in the Yellow Sheep River Project in China, where the children's drawings of their visions of the future were copied onto earthen village walls. The heavy stock paper of the book cover and coarse paper inside the volume echo the dusty rural environment. Prints that flow page to page create continuity and associations with winding walls in the second part. A concertina book with two-sided gate fold paper presents the children's drawings alongside the paintings on the wall in the fifth part. Hand detailing and five-color letterpress printing evoke premium quality.

Project Name: TSO-2010 Brochure | Brochure (227-69460)

Category: 03.2 Information media

Designer: ELITE Brand Image Design Co., Ltd.

Client / Manufacturer: Taipei Symphony Orchestra, Taiwan

Taipei Symphony Orchestra's second-half 2011 program continues the layout of the first half in one series. With a dual-cover design, the program whets the appetite of concert fans in Taipei and enhances the musicians' wow factor with a throw-out design to segment visuals and texts, all of which makes reading the program more amusing.

The inner page layout contains two key design elements: 1. Top-bottom design for detailed information; 2. Right-to-left design to highlight large key visuals. Graphics helps to accentuate musical atmosphere and mood to animate the repertoires and enhance effect.

Project Name: Bloom | Campaign (227-69468)

Category: 04.1 Advertising | Campaigns

Designer: PEGA D&E

Client / Manufacturer: PEGA D&E

Bloom is the advertising theme built on the idea of metamorphosis. In the 2010 Taiwan Designer's Week, the company developed a series of interactive products to show the Bloom theme, with different soft materials widely applied to the designs to achieve unexpected user experiences. The Bloom theme is applicable to exhibition identity, giveaways, handouts, booth design, and micro-site to plant such idea and spread it among visitors.

Project Name: ELITE Design | Official Website (227-69957)

Category: 01.1 Corporate Websites

Designer: ELITE Brand Image Design Co., Ltd.

Client / Manufacturer: ELITE Brand Image Design Co., Ltd.

Elite Brand Image Design Co., after 28 years, in 2009 created a new logo as well as brand new website coupled with the latest technology that matches the search engine optimized (SEO) layout, with the website being design-driven and achieving a simple, modern image.

Due to massive flow of information, the designer uses gray color to ease tension while browsing, also to easily to exhibit design works and styles. The website utilizes an innovative technology to hide the default scroll to prevent the inconvenience of multiple scrolling tools.

Project Name: City Reading, Poster Design Exhibition Collection | Book design (227-75321)

Category: 03.6 Publishing

Designer: SHIH DESIGN

Client / Manufacturer: SHIH DESIGN

City Reading is a collection of posters expressing the ideas of reading and urbanism. Inspired by the Chinese proverb: “Walk ten thousand miles, read ten thousand books,” the cover conveys the inseparable relationship between reading and journeying through life. The design starts with a simplistic hardcover and subtle palette. The lower-left corner uses die cutting to fit in a miniature that contains the same but miniaturized set of posters, which takes to new heights our understanding of books, reminding readers of the intimate relationship between books and men.

Project Name: Gallery More | Fashion Retail Showroom (227-76627)

Category: 05.4 Architecture | Interior design

Designer: X-Line Design Co., Ltd.

Client / Manufacturer: X-Line Design Co., Ltd.

Clothing stores ideally should not only offer fashions but also inspire shoppers and want to wear the latest designs. Gallery More in Lodong, Ilan has upgraded the fashion shopping experience by designing the store with the touch of an art gallery. Instead of merely displaying fashions, the store also treats clothing as artworks, enabling shoppers to turn mundane clothes buying, browsing into an art-appreciating experience.

Project Name: Company Profile | Print media (227-81256)

Category: 03.3 Advertising media

Designer: Victor Branding Design

Client / Manufacturer: Victor Branding Design

“The Quest for Tea” campaign aims to promote the objective of trekking the mountains of Taiwan to find, taste the finest alpine teas. This manual is created to introduce Taiwan's tea culture, which is closely knit with the lives of many tea-cultivating communities on the island, who were introduced to tea growing due to the profit potential. The guide shows readers the early history of tea cup, through the evolution of tea brewing to also reveal the essence of traditional, hardworking, thrifty Taiwanese society.

Project Name: Chiu Chunt Dint Menu | Product brochures (227-81257)

Category: 03.3 Advertising media

Designer: Victor Branding Design

Client / Manufacturer: Victor Branding Design

Chiu Chunt Dint Hotel is also a tavern that provides dining in Jioufen, Keelung for visitors looking for a walk down memory lane dated 1970s to 1980s. Based on nostalgic exploration of Jioufen and bygone vinyl LP albums, the menu design takes the form of a collection of vinyl LPs, with the woodchip cover branded with the logo to evoke as if unadulterated memories of yesteryear.

Project Name: Trip View Bowl | Tourism promotion (227-81292)

Category: 03.3 Advertising media

Designer: Arty Design

Client / Manufacturer: Arty Design

Trip View Bowl overcomes typical weakness of ordinary maps to promote tourist spots, by showing diverse faces of a place with labeled fish-eye and bird's eye pictures. Typical maps offer clear but uninteresting geographic information while illustrated guides usually lack accuracy. Trip View Bowl leads viewers into a location by using a bowl's perspective to create a realistic spatial sense. A new brand is also created by using a series of bowl views of tourist spots that are highlighted via unique scenery and culture to promote local tourism.