Conclusions of the panel on the first internationally presented wemhöner award 2004:
When entering into a dialogue of this kind with the fresh creativity of young students and people starting their careers, the industry gets a superb chance to test the limits of what is feasible. New technologies, after all, have always led to new product designs at the point where, after an initial phase of awkward handling, the design reached solutions in the realm of meaning and total approach which met the limitations of technical possibilities. - And today? - Today, design goes beyond finding the beautiful form and is much more than simply the result of the technical production method. Design is more and more what gives a product the competitive edge, the ultimate personal product quality. Design, after all, will always be a way of interpreting the world in which we live and of experiencing it with all our senses, of defining our own point of view, even of reinventing ourselves.
In this sense, the entries submitted are a "powerful service" of the coming generation of designers, which will in turn instigate a no less "committed return" of the technology R & D teams, and some "intensive leg work" on the part of the industrial users. The ball is now in the other court ...
Senior Consultant, heading the sector Innovations of the consultants for social change "Trendbüro - Beratungsunternehmen für gesellschaftlichen Wandel" in Hamburg
ad personam
Birgit Gebhard, born in 1969, heads the sector Innovations of the "Trendbüro- Beratungsunternehmen für gesellschaftlichen Wandel" in Hamburg. Following her Interior Design studies, Birgit Gebhard gained international experience in renowned planning offices, a.o. with André Puttmann in Paris and Arata Isozaki in Tokyo, before moving on to design journalism in 1996, with 4 years on the editorial board of the magazine >design report<.
short statement
"The 3D-technology is today expanding the formal design choices of architects, designers and
engineers, and visions are converted to data, thereby becoming factually realizable. Visions of
designers are, however, undergoing adaptations due to consumer requests which have to be actively
incorporated into the design process. Industrial design is turning into individual design."














