Cooper Hewitt has named the winners of this year’s National Design Awards, which “celebrate design as a vital humanistic tool in shaping the world, and seek to increase national awareness of design by educating the public and promoting excellence, innovation and lasting achievement.” Moshe Safdie won for Lifetime Achievement, Marlon Blackwell Architects for Architecture Design, and Hargreaves Associates for Landscape Architecture. Studio O+A principals Primo Orpilla, Verda Alexander and Perry Stephney are being honored with the Interior Design award.
Perry Stephney, Primo Orpilla and Verda Alexander of Studio O+A
“The National Design Awards are a vibrant component of Cooper Hewitt’s education arm, through which the museum engages year round with design lovers of all ages, across the United States and throughout the world,” said Caroline Baumann, director of Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum. “This year’s class of winners reflect design’s remarkable empathy for contemporary social concerns: from promoting workplace productivity to preserving vernacular traditions to encouraging civic engagement. These designers and design firms cross disciplinary boundaries, explore innovative materials and develop new models of problem-solving in pursuit of these goals.”
First Lady Michelle Obama is the Honorary Patron for this year’s National Design Awards, which was first debuted at the White House in 2000 as a project of the White House Millennium Council. The award recipients will be honored at a gala dinner on October 20 at the Cooper Hewitt.
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