TAIPEI, Dec. 1, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- With countries in the world growingly concerned with issues of climate and environmental changes, uneven distribution of resources, and sustainability, global designers have also started to proactively shift their attention onto social issues. Unlike traditional designs that focused on "product" and "function," designers have turned to "people" and "environment" as the focus of their works, and more and more of them begin to propose different observations and solutions for social issues of sustainable industrial development, wealth gap, and ageing population, changing life through design, and the concept of building better environment through the power of design is becoming more prominent across the world.
TRASHPRESSO by Miniwiz wins 2021 WDIP, they brings TRASHPRESSO to Tibet and builds a school using local wastes/Photo credit: Miniwiz
WDO launched the biennial World Design Impact Prize™ (WDIP) in 2011, encouraging designers to apply design to solve the social, economic, cultural, and environmental problems the world will face in real urban development, in order to enhance world citizens' quality of life and create a better environment.
Since the award ceremony at World Design Capital Taipei in 2016, the Fourth WDIP finally called for submissions again after a four-year hiatus. This edition of WDIP focused on the theme of SDGs, and applicants were recommended by WDO members. Taiwan Design Research Institute, a WDO member in Taiwan, recommended TRASHPRESSO by Taiwanese firm Miniwiz to represent Taiwan at this year's WDIP.
This year's WDIP jury consisted of five experts in different disciplines, including Chetan Choudhury, an advisor with the Prime Minister's Office of the UAE in Dubai, Teresa Franqueira, associate professor at Aveiro University, and Wenny Kusuma, former UN Women Country Representative in Cambodia. The jurors selected 10 most iconic real cases from a pool of 129 global submissions as finalists, and 170 WDO member organizations around the globe voted for the winners. Miniwiz's TRASHPRESSO won the First Prize of the 2021 WDIP, marking Taiwan's first win at the global design award, a testament to the universal recognition of Taiwan design.
"Turning wastes into gold" is the belief and motive Arthur Huang has continued developing since founding Miniwiz. The WDIP-winning TRASHPRESSO is the world's first portable industrial-grade plastic waste recycling platform with a size of merely two industrial refrigerators. It makes the collection, classification, and conversion of garbage more democratic, and consumes only 7,000W of power, leaving minimal air/water footprints. The machine is capable of converting industrial and domestic wastes into valuable materials such as sustainable building supplies, special textiles, and furniture, through 3-minute cycles, and can process up to 500 kg of plastic waste daily for a community of 10,000 people.
Now, Miniwiz is bringing TRASHPRESSO to cooperate with global organizations, such as using local wastes to build schools in Tibet, and turning ocean plastics collected through beach cleaning activities into the floor tiles of Sardinia Community Center. Through innovative design thinking, Miniwiz facilitates real changes to the seemingly complicated and irreversible social issues. "Design for a better tomorrow" has become a global trend, and Taiwan design is also exerting its influences in all corners of the world.
