Blueprint Awards 2018 Winners Announced!
Blueprint Award for Design 2018
Winner: Oki Sato
Nominated by our Judges, voted for by Blueprint readers
During Milan Design Week 2018, Nendo’s installation at Superstudio was an undoubted highlight with people literally queuing around the block to get in and see the 10 families of products investigating movement from this creative powerhouse.
Nendo, which means modelling clay, was founded back in 2002 in Tokyo by Blueprint Award for Design 2018 winner Oki Sato, who went on to set up a Milan office three years later.
Sato was actually born in Toronto. His family returned to Japan where he studied and in 2000 graduated as the top student from the Department of Architecture, School of Science and Engineering, Waseda University. He went on to do his MA, completing that and setting up Nendo in the same year.
Some sixteen years later, the consultancy now has a wide range of projects under its belt, from interior design through to architecture, from graphic design to corporate branding and even a new rugby strip for his alma mater Waseda’s team. Sato is however probably best known for his deeply considered, innovative approach to product design. Sato uses design as an investigative tool to push the boundaries of the physical objects he creates, which invariably surprise and delight with a lightness of touch and often a hint of humour.
A much-anticipated exhibition design for 160 works by Dutch artist MC Escher at the National Gallery of Victoria in Melbourne, Australia, this December, promises to play to all of Nendo and Sato’s strengths of inventiveness, playfulness and visual delight.
Nominations
Studio Formafantasma
Oki Sato, Nendo
Category sponsored by Turkish Ceramics
