How can design awards affect your career?

Why would you enter your design for the Henry van de Velde Awards? Or for any award for that matter? What can that mean for you as a designer? And what is the importance of which award? We put these questions to the following designers: Pieter Willems of graphic design agency Pjotr and silversmith Nedda El-Asmar of Studio Nedda. They have not only both already won Henry van de Velde Awards, but they have also won several other competitions. Is there a common thread? Especially for young designers, the awards are an excellent tool to put their name on the map.

As a graphic designer, Pieter Willems specialises in typographic work with his firm Pjotr. “Typography is the basis not only for the magazines of which I do the layout, but also for all my other designs. The design should help to make a story more interesting and communicate better to the reader. Although I make sure that it never becomes more important than the content of the article itself,” says Willems. “For example, for the graphic design of the football magazine Puskás, I played with typical elements from football, such as the lines on the pitch or the club emblems. The content of the magazine was also structured like a match. As a designer, I like to be very involved in the content, because I’m not an artist, so I don’t design for the sake of design. That’s why I like being on the editorial board so that I can participate in discussions about every article.”

Willems was nominated twice in a row for the Henry van de Velde Communication Award for his designs for the Bahamontes and Puskás magazines. “I am very pleased with this recognition, because the awards are the most prestigious in Belgium. Moreover, the jury is not composed of just any professionals in the sector, and many names of remarkable colleagues adorn the honours list. A nomination such as this is therefore a real mark of quality for your work. And, of course, it flatters your ego as a designer and confirms the path you are taking. In addition, such a nomination is an acknowledgement for everyone who has worked on the product: the editors, writers, photographers, etc. It is also a pat on the back and a boost for the product itself. This is how even more readers found their way to Bahamontes, and we hoped it would do the same for Puskás.”

According to Pieter Willems, other advantages associated with design awards such as the Henry van de Velde Awards and the East Flanders Provincial Prize for Design, which he won, are the exhibitions and the network that can be developed through them. “The prizes offer you the opportunity to show your work and possibly reach a new audience. Although at the same time I am not entirely sure whether such a prize directly leads to new customers. However, it does contribute to your credibility anyway, which may ultimately lead to potential customers being convinced,” says Willems. “It is also fascinating to get to know colleagues from other design disciplines during the accompanying events. Because although our end products are different, there are also many similarities in our work. Since I am curious and always looking for different approaches, I like networking. In that sense, the recent dinner for the alumni of the Henry van de Velde Awards was an excellent initiative. The top of the Flemish design world gathered there and found out the winners and nominees of this edition in Bozar at the same time.”

Since the very beginning of her career, designer and silversmith Nedda El-Asmar has regularly worked for prestigious foreign companies such as Hermès, Puiforcat and Robbe & Berking. That earned her several awards in France. She received the Henry van de Velde Award for Young Talent in Belgium in 1997. “Despite this award, national interest remained relatively limited. I am not exactly sure how it came about that Belgium fell behind in that regard. I think that our companies in my sector attached less importance to external designers. It was often the boss who made the designs. Fortunately, that has changed completely today. Companies are now aware of the added value a designer can bring. Awards such as the Henry van de Velde Awards have certainly contributed to this change in mentality. Through the awards, the companies heard more about the designers and were able to come and discover their work at the exhibitions,” says Nedda El-Asmar.

Only when she was elected Designer of the Year in 2007 did more Belgian companies come her way. “The only company I was working with before that award was Eternum. Together we released the now well-known Appetize cutlery in 2006, with small forks and spoons. After winning my title of Designer of the Year, Knack Weekend and Le Vif Weekend organised a promotional campaign for the matching salad servers, which accelerated that and helped the collection gain recognition even faster. Now, a good ten years later, it’s still selling well,” she says. “Then we designed a mussel pot for Demeyere, and we came up with the Hans Christian bed for Magnitude two years ago.”

Although the awards are less important at this point in her career, she is happy to have taken part when she was younger. “It’s an excellent way to showcase yourself as a designer. The awards often involve a lot of press attention or an exhibition, and sometimes they also give you a financial boost. Each prize offers you other advantages. At the same time, it is different today, because the way we communicate has changed completely. With social media, everything is much faster than it was then, when we were still working with slides and a fax,” says El-Asmar.

“Finally, I like the fact that thanks to the prizes I won in the past, I now occasionally have another opportunity to showcase my work, such as the tenth anniversary celebration of the Designer of the Year. This way, you stay in contact not only with the general public, but also with fellow designers. That is why we must definitely retain local prizes, such as the Flemish Design Prize that I won in 2008,” says El-Asmar.