Croatian Designers Society, Mikser and Public Room are inviting young Industrial designers from thirteen (13) Balkan countries to enter their best conceptual and completed industrial design work in the Young Balkan Designers 2014 Competition.
Ten (10) best projects will be selected to participate in the Young Balkan Designers exhibition (touring all major regional design events and fairs in 2014) and three (3) best designers among the exhibition participants will be invited to attend a series of residency workshops and practical trainings around the region (Zagreb, Belgrade, Skopje).
The Young Balkan Designers slogan for 2014: “Everyday Heroes” emphasizes the power of simple, incremental changes in social behavior that designers can contribute to their community, collaborating with the locals, visioning and solving local problems and needs related to the economic crisis, limited resources, and the necessity for people to search for alternatives to inefficient public services.
The call is open for more impactful design solutions that can serve as a catalyst for social innovation in everyday lives within local communities, and mobilizes designers to provide not only the final products, but to design tools, concepts and services that help communities and individuals to solve their own problems.
The Young Balkan Designers 2014 competition is open to all persons aged 35 years and younger, from: Albania, Austria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Hungary, Macedonia, Montenegro, Romania, Slovenia, Serbia and Turkey.
Applicants may be individuals or groups of creators and submit more than one entry.
As a a joined project of the Croatian Designers Society (Hrvatsko Dizajnersko Društvo), Mikser from Serbia and Public Room from Macedonia the Young Balkan Designers initiative aims at unifying regional design scene, bringing it closer to the international market, strengthening its creative potential by offering additional education and practice, while at the same time contributes to the restoration of multicultural cooperation in the Balkan region.
