Winning top international design awards
THE students of the School of Interior Architecture and Design, The One Academy, once again proved themselves to be worthy adversaries in the global creative field of design by accumulating six top awards in the International Art and Design Competition 2017 in Florence, Italy, recently.
The third edition of the art and design competition was organised and hosted by Accademia Riaci, an art and design university. Besides being a reputable institution, its strategic location in Florence makes it desirable as the competition’s host. Dubbed as a “museum with no roof”, Florence gave birth to the Italian Renaissance where iconic artists such as Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci flourished during the 16th century.
As such, the interior architecture and design students grasped the opportunity to test their knowledge and skills as well as gauge their abilities in the international art and design arena by submitting their artworks and projects to one of the major art capitals of the world.
With the competition’s main objective in promoting Italian art and fostering talents in new artists, contestants were required to submit entries that embody the culture of their own countries to accommodate the theme “Traditional Costume of Your Country”, which can be expressed in any form of art.
Six interior architecture and design students of The One Academy, who took part in five of the 10 competition categories, revelled in their victory as the overall results were announced.
Under the Interior Design Category, student Juan Zhi Yang beat his competitors from other countries to become the grand prize winner. He adopted the “Go Green” concept in his interior designs for high-end restaurant spaces, including the bar, garden, lounge and wine cellar.
Juan obtains his inspiration for his designs from the surroundings.
“I believe that even the most complicated concept and idea can be taken from the simplest thing in life. You can be inspired by the most random thing, be it a piece of broken branch or a used plastic bag,” he said.
Another student who was placed second in the same category was Chong Wei Chen. Chong also provided designs for an upscale restaurant.
The first prize winner in the Fashion Design Category, Daniel Teh Kuan Yon, impressed the panel of judges with his “Transformation of Time-Honoured” collection. It featured traditional garments of the Malays, Chinese and Indians, which have highly influenced each other throughout the course of time.
To give an edge to his designs, Teh transformed the traditional garments in a modern way to give them a fresh perspective while