2020 International Design Excellence Awards (IDEA) Winners Revealed

Under normal circumstances, the 40th annual International Design Excellence Awards (IDEA) Ceremony would have been held in a packed auditorium in Seattle, but this year had other plans. Due to the global coronavirus pandemic, the Industrial Designers Society of America (IDSA) brought the IDEA Ceremony online on Wednesday, Sept. 16, the day before the virtual International Design Conference (IDC), Sept. 17-18.

The placement of the Gold, Silver, and Bronze IDEA winners and the Special Award winners were revealed live during the virtual Ceremony, held over Zoom, with recipients accepting Gold and Special awards in video messages. See all of the winners in the IDEA Gallery. 

Jonah Becker, IDSA, Senior Vice President of Design at Fitbit and the IDEA 2020 Jury Chair, was joined by Qin Li, IDSA, the Chair of IDSA’s Board of Directors and Vice President of Design at fuseproject, in presenting the IDEA-winning designs.

Li began by noting that 2020 marks both the end of an era for design and a time for new beginnings. “Our design community has been able to come together and find ways to innovate, all remotely and across new disciplines and industries,” Li said. “The only way forward is to recognize and acknowledge these gaps that we have been operating and living in, and commit to continue to address these issues in every intersection. This is the time for us as designers to look closely at where changes can be made to better prepare us in the future and to prevent the same mistakes from repeating themselves.”

She also commented on the inequities that continue to permeate the design industry, which Becker addressed as well in the introduction to his pick for the 2020 Jury Chair’s Award. “The judging took place under unique circumstances: a pandemic that has disproportionately affected communities of color, and the Black Lives Matter movement that has fueled action against systemic racism in the United States,” Becker said. “This cultural context was present in our deliberations and put a spotlight on entries that were driving social impact.”

The jury selected all of the 2020 Gold, Silver, and Bronze IDEA winners from over 1,800 entries that came from 25 different countries and regions around the world. 124 of those entries were chosen for awards, and 20 were designated as Gold winners.

Each year, the jury reviews IDEA entries across five criteria: Design Innovation, Benefit to the User, Benefit to the Client, Benefit to Society, and Appropriate Aesthetics. These five criteria have remained unchanged during the 40-year history of IDEA and are part of what makes this program so unique among other design award programs.

See below for the 2020 list of IDEA Gold, Silver, and Bronze winners by category, followed by the Special Award winners. Details, designers, and photos of all the winners can be found in the IDEA Gallery.