The winners of the 2017 European Design Awards have been unveiled at a ceremony in Porto's Rivoli Theatre. This year's Awards gathered a record number of submissions coming from 34 different countries, whereas the awarded work came from 24 European countries in total. In the 41 competition categories, the ED-Awards juries handed out 32 gold, 49 silver, and 49 bronze prizes.
The 2017 European Design Agency of the year is Silo. Silo identities itself as a human-centered design agency with ideas. It combines design, UX and branding expertise to help clients think beyond the expected and innovate their businesses. Silo is the first studio to ever win the title "European Design Agency of the year" in two different occasions (the first one being 2010).
The ED-Awards Best of Show was given to Cymru Wales Sans, a unique family of fonts representing Wales in an authentic and creative way. According to the jury, the specific font family addresses a very special need in a totally contemporary way (on print, digital and signs). It is a good example of what typography can do for the public sphere.
The ED-Awards Jury Prize was awarded to "Like a pearl in my hand", a multi-sensory experience encouraging social awareness on the subject of abandoned visually impaired children in China. It is presented as a 32 print limited and signed edition box, that according to the jury, leads the audience to rethink the use of ink and paper. The project illustrates how graphic design can bring across important messages with purely visual and haptic means.
