About the Red Dot Award: Design Concept

In 2005, the design award recognised the need to identify and celebrate new design concept and innovation, the precursor of today's design challenges and tomorrow’s great product. Believing a design concept must be evaluated based on its design merit without prejudice, this design competition created a unprecedented platform that accept entries from companies to design students.

Awards

Red Dot: Luminary

Red Dot: Luminary is the highest achievement of the Red Dot Award: Design Concept. A leading light to follow, this concept is selected among the Red Dot: Best of the Best winners. The Red Dot: Luminary serves as an inspiration to aspire towards.

Red Dot: Best of the Best

The Red Dot: Best of the Best is awarded for groundbreaking design and is the top prize in the Red Dot Award: Design Concept. This prize is reserved for the best works in a category.

Red Dot

The Red Dot is the award for high design quality. The international jury only awards this sought-after seal of quality to works that set themselves apart significantly from comparable works thanks to their excellent design.

Red Dot: Honourable Mention

An Honourable Mention recognises particularly well-executed aspects of design work, and is awarded to works with excellent detail solutions.

Categories
There are 42 categories to select from. Each category name is deliberately vague and broad to encourage unhindered imagination and innovation. The list of examples following each categories are samples and should not limit your entry. A single design concept can be submitted multiple times under different categories if the concept has attributes that is fitting to different categories.
Architecture

Private houses, public housing, commercial buildings, civic and public institution buildings, museums, stations, conservation and preservation of old buildings, others

Habitat

Mobile homes, underwater homes, rapid deployment housing, capsules, caravan homes, tents, marquees, interior design, interior architecture, co-working spaces others

Public Space

Urban design, bridges, street lighting, roads and traffic systems, recreation and civic spaces, outdoor seating, street information systems, shelters, bus-stops, car parks, public parks, free access spaces, others

Red Dot Jury

Due to the current situation, this year the submissions will be assessed online.The Red Dot Jury comprises 20 international experts.

The projects and brands are not compared directly against each other, and no preselection takes place. In order to prevent conflicts of interest and to ensure the highest possible degree of neutrality, the jurors commit to the “Code of Honour”. Based on the code, they are not permitted to enter their own works or projects they have been involved in, so that they neither assess their own work nor the work of potential competitors.

More information >
Judging Criteria

Concepts

Degree of innovation
Is the concept, product or service new or does it supplement an existing product with a new desirable quality?

Aesthetic quality
Is the concept’s form pleasant to look at?

Realisation possibility
Does the concept, product or service have a reasonable chance to be developed as a finished product or service within the next 5 years, from a technological and economical point of view?

Functionality
Does the concept, product or service fulfil all requirements of handling, usability, safety, and maintenance? Does it fulfil a need or function?

Emotional content
Does the concept, product or service offer the user enjoyment beyond mere practical purpose?

Impact
Does the concept, product or service deliver a substantial or significant benefit?

Ready to Launch

Differentiation
How is the “ready to launch” product or service different from existing marketing offerings? Is the difference positive and does it add value for the user?

Aesthetic quality
Is the “ready to launch” product’s form pleasant to look at?

Realisation possibility
Can the “ready to launch“ product or service be reasonably be expected to be ready for delivery to the market within the next 12 months?

Functionality
Does the “ready to launch“ product or service fulfil all requirements of handling, usability, safety, and maintenance? Does it fulfil a need or function?

Emotional content
Does the “ready to launch“ product or service offer the user enjoyment beyond mere practical purpose?

Red Dot: Luminary award

The Red Dot: Luminary is the highest level of recognition accorded at the Red Dot Award: Design Concept. It is selected among the Red Dot: Best of the Best winners. The Red Dot: Luminary serves as an inspiration to aspire towards.

Red Dot Design Ranking for Design Concept

The Red Dot Design Ranking for design concept tracks and measures the success of an organisation in producing exciting new design concepts over a period of time. It is a reflection of real sustainable design innovation capability of an organisation. It gives these companies and institutions the recognition that they deserve and encouragement toward their continued investment in design.

View the most recent rankings >