Trend: Innovative materials and new achievements in leisure and sports

The product group "Leisure, Sports, Wellness and Caravanning" is changing faster than any other category in the “red dot awards: product design.” The aim has been to evoke a “user spirit;” therefore, criteria such as ergonomics, usability for sports and how intuitive they are to use play a major role. It has been the same this year: Innovations optimise these criteria and one highlight is to be found in textiles. When manufactured using a new kind of sewing machine, textile life jackets and tents, for instance, show completely new characteristics.

Another trend that has become prominent during the last couple of years is, as the jury members Francesco Milani, Max Ottenwälder und Gianfranco Zaccai observe, the employment of technology and, thus, the sense of interaction between product and user. The leisure sector also was a place for technological innovations, and fun sports particularly were increasingly adopting achievements from related sectors of design. The result: bicycle helmets, for example, that feature sound-proofing based on developments in noise research – and design, such as that of tents, that follows the laws of aerodynamics. A remark from the jury: With some products there was still the need for further development in the area of human interface. They were rather fuzzy and in some cases even misleading for the user. An important task for the future!

Jurors: Francesco Milani, Max Ottenwälder, Gianfranco Zaccai

You can find the winners of "red dot: best of the best" 2004 here.